Frontline Donations

Dear Pagliacci Customers,

Pagliacci is deeply committed to supporting the communities in which we do business. We’ve been involved in many ways, including efforts to remedy the homeless crisis, supporting many beneficial organizations throughout the greater Seattle area, and encouraging local businesses to reduce their impact on our environment.

But nothing we’ve faced before compares with the challenge our region now faces as we struggle with the horrors inflicted by the novel coronavirus. Each day has brought head-spinning adjustments to each of our lives. Few have as much pressure on their shoulders as our brave frontline health care workers and the researchers racing to develop treatments and a vaccine for the virus. Like so many, we’ve been following the patient count, the 18-hour shifts, and the awe-inspiring research—and the rising numbers of healthcare workers infected with Covid-19.

When a customer, Ellen Kuwana, called to place a large order to support the researchers at the University of Washington Department of Virology, we donated it instead. Donations to those working to save our lives seemed like a small part of what we could do. We’re all in this together, and everyone in our community has a role to play. For some, it’s staying home, for others, like mail carriers, grocery store clerks, delivery people and cooks, it’s providing essential services.

Our role is to make and deliver pizza, a comfort food for those who need a night off from cooking, or don’t have the time or a kitchen to prepare their own meal. So we expanded our donations to multiple Swedish Hospital campuses, UW Medical Centers, Harborview, and Evergreen Hospital. And recognizing that while nurses and doctors are the most visible frontline workers, a great many behind-the-scenes workers are putting in long hours and exposing themselves to risk—receptionists, respiratory therapists, counselors, telephone operators, environmental service workers who keep everything clean, and pharmacists—to name a few. So we upped our donations again.

We were flattered and grateful when UW and NBA basketball star Isaiah Thomas joined in by placing several large pizza orders with us to help feed the fatigued doctors and nurses at the UW Hospitals. Friends and customers have reached out to ask us if they can help pay for the donations, or set up a GoFundMe account so others could chip in. After thinking long and hard, we decided this was not the right thing to do. This is something we can do. It's our contribution.

You can help by continuing to do your part, whether that’s staying home, or filling an essential service. And, of course, by ordering pizza when the urge strikes.

Thank you, health care workers, and thank you, Seattle.

Matt Galvin, Co-owner Pagliacci Pizza