By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
St. Joseph resident and native Jennie McDonald was finishing up some Christmas shopping at the Sisters of Solace's Solace Market - a retail shop that sells products sourced by women-owned businesses.
It was here that McDonald, while shopping for candles, received the winning ticket in this year's Shop St. Joseph Program and with it, the $10,000 grand prize.
McDonald says she was honored to win, and even more honored to support a small, local business.
"We're so excited to shop local businesses this Christmas," McDonald told the media Thursday. "We have family and friends who have a small business here in St. Joseph, so we try and strongly support them as best we can. Very proud to especially support Sisters of Solace."
Sisters of Solace is a home for healing and hospitality for survivors of trauma and addiction and for those who are homeless.
Jennie's husband, Shane McDonald, says they plan to be charitable with some of this prize money during this time of year.
"I personally feel like I've been blessed far beyond what I deserve," he said. "Rest assured, some of this cash has already been decided to be used to help others in the community right now. That's one of the things we're going to do with this cash to begin with."
New this year in the Shop St. Joseph program was a $2500 prize for shopping local at small businesses - dubbed as the "Shop Small Business Bonus."
That prize was claimed by Angie Luthans of St. Joseph, who got the winning ticket at BJ’s Auto Collision and Restoration, Inc.
This was the 17th year of Shop St. Joseph. The program’s goal is to keep holiday spending in the local economy, so sales tax collected goes back into helping St. Joseph and Buchanan County projects.
Shop St. Joseph was presented by First Option Bank.
You can follow Tommy on Twitter @TommyKFEQ and St. Joseph Post @StJosephPost.