Wirtz Beverage employees, Salute team up to help vet

Around the Palatine offices of Salute Inc. — the nonprofit organization that helps returning military — they call them “bluebirds.”

“They're blessings that fly in out of nowhere and come into our midst,” says Mary Beth Beiersdorf, executive director, who co-founded the agency in 2003 with her husband, Will.

The latest bluebird came in the form of a major donation from employees of Wirtz Beverage Illinois, which in 2012 consolidated its Schaumburg headquarters and warehouses in Wood Dale, Bensenville and Elk Grove Village into one location in Cicero.

Wirtz Beverage is a division of Chicago-based Wirtz Corp., whose diversified interests include ownership of the Chicago Blackhawks. Wirtz employees credit their president, Rocky Wirtz, with instilling his passion for helping the military into their employee culture.

Leading up to the holidays, employees in Illinois raised more than $30,000 for their companywide Wirtz for Warriors campaign, more than tripling the goal, aided in part by financial support from Wirtz suppliers Diageo and Red Bull.

One of the members of Salute's new Young Associate Board knew one of the marketing managers with Wirtz and that they were looking for a military organization to fund and the connection was made.

“The timing couldn't have been better,” says Jake Lavin, who works in marketing for Wirtz's Regal division. “When we heard about Salute, we felt it fit right in with our company's vision.”

Lavin and co-worker Kristen Trieloff led the holiday campaign. They invited Beiersdorf and other Salute officials to come to Wirtz sales division offices and describe what they do.

When they learned about Salute's efforts to help Marine Rocky Loera, a veteran of four deployments to Afghanistan, who suffered a traumatic brain injury after being hit by a car while leading recruits on a training run, they made an immediate connection.

“It started with his name,” Lavin said. “His name was Rocky, and our owner's name is Rocky. But the more we learned about his story — it was just gut wrenching.”

Loera, his wife, Brenda, and their two young sons have been living in a small apartment in River Forest. They had intended to stay for one year while he worked at the U.S. Naval Reserve Recruiting Center in Forest Park.

His accident two years ago changed his life — and the lives of his family members — forever.

He has endured 14 surgical procedures, including craniotomies, bilateral cranioplasty, and the implantation and removal of various shunts, drains and tubes. For the last year, he has undergone intense therapies at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago.

Lavin and Trieloff met Loera and his wife Brenda in November, about midway through their fundraising efforts.

“We thanked him for his service,” Lavin said, “but it was just so powerful to hear about the struggles they were facing.”

Wirtz employees took up collections at sales meetings, contributed money online and sold raffle tickets for the chance to attend Blackhawks games. When their fundraising wrapped up, they were stunned to learn they had tripled their goal.

Salute is helping Loera and his family move back to their native California, where work has begun to make their home in Temecula, located in Southwestern Riverside County, handicapped accessible.

“This is a major donation for us,” Beiersdorf says. “These funds will almost totally cover the cost of retrofitting the family's bathrooms and adjusting the arch of their hallways.”

Stories like Loera's will be shared on Friday, when more than 500 supporters are expected to attend Salute's annual pizza party. The event has grown so popular, that organizers moved it from Arlington Park to the Rosemont Convention Center.

Its main attraction is the chance for local residents to help wounded veterans with their immediate needs. Last year alone, Salute helped more than 300 military families with their emergency financial needs — ranging from housing, utilities and moving expenses, to providing computers and other equipment.

“Our mission has stayed the same, but we're concentrating on helping returning veterans with their re-entry into civilian life,” Beiersdorf says. “Keeping families together and getting them stable after their deployment is what drives us.”

If you go

What: Salute's 12th annual Pizza Party

When: 6:30-11 p.m. Friday, Feb. 6

Where: Rosemont Ballroom at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont

Cost: $60 at the door

Information: <a href="http://www.saluteinc.org">www.saluteinc.org</a>