With the televised announcement this morning of the recipient of the Community Cares $50,000 Home Remodel Giveaway, a local startup with a unique concept is celebrating its first successful charitable campaign and hoping the promotion will help further the company’s continued growth.
Homebuyer Discounts is the brainchild of president Frank Ardoin, who came up with the idea in 2012 to start a company that brought together local merchants, who would offer special discounts to customers who pay an annual membership fee to access the discounts. In launching the Community Cares promotion, Ardoin is hoping to give back to the community and get some publicity for his young company.
“It just made sense for us at this point to do something great for a family in our community and get the word out about us,” Ardoin says.
This morning, WAFB-TV aired a segment on the winners of the $50,000 giveaway: Eduardo and Sommer Francis, who live with their three children in a 1,300-square-foot home on Berremore Drive in Shenandoah. They were selected from among three finalist families, who were among more than 400 who entered the contest and explained why they were in need of a home remodel during this holiday season.
All of the merchants in the Homebuyer Discounts’ network—which has members ranging from Olindes Furniture and Halpin’s Flooring to Kean’s Fine Dry Cleaning and Gerry Lane—donated home furnishings, supplies and services for the promotion, which will ensure the Francis home is outfitted with a new roof, flooring, furniture, cabinets, countertops and a generator. A handicapped-accessible walk-in tub will also be installed in the bathroom, Ardoin says, to help Eduardo Francis, whose mobility has been limited since he suffered a stroke two years ago.
Ardoin is hoping the exposure from the giveaway, as well as other planned promotions and media campaigns, will help his company grow its customer memberships to more than 7,000 by this time next year. Ardoin is also drumming up business through his contacts in the real estate market; he’s also the owner/president of Resource Lending Group.
“I’ve been in the mortgage industry for 20 years in Baton Rouge, and I saw the need for customers to be able to purchase home products or services in one location, and that’s where this idea came from,” he says.
It’s an idea he hopes is good enough to eventually afford further expansions into the Lafayette and New Orleans markets too.
As for the Community Cares promotion, he says it will return next year, and eventually he hopes to see it rise to a $100,000 remodel giveaway. He’s also working on a promotion involving local schools, by which a percentage of of parents’ membership fees would help pay for their children’s books. Ardoin says he’s also pursuing a social media campaign. The company publishes a blog that provides tips for homeowners, such as how to prepare a house for winter or the benefits of carpet versus wood flooring. Ardoin says those posts are shared on Facebook and are also bringing in new members.
“We think it’s going to take a little time,” Ardoin says of the company’s growth goals. “It is a new brand, but the marketing plan is there.” —Steve Sanoski
