11 Minnesota Non-Profits Picked for Free Overnight Website Makeover
MINNEAPOLIS, February 18, 2008 – Eleven Minnesota non-profits will lose sleep while gaining a free professionally-designed and fully-developed website to further their mission at Sierra Bravo’s F1 Overnight Website Challenge presented by VISI, an event matching talented volunteer web pros with these non-profits:
The 24-hour countdown starts at 8:30 a.m. on Saturday, March 1, when non-profits and web development teams meet to begin creating a new website, unburdened by budget constraints or long production timelines. The evetn will be held at the University of Minnesota Continuing Education and Conference Center in St. Paul.
“We reviewed applications and existing websites of 33 non-profits – and made some hard choices in selecting 11,” said Minnesota Council of Non-Profits’ Communication Director Christine Durand, one of four selection judges. “After seeing where they’re all starting from I look forward to seeing them move their mission forward on the web.”
Other selection judges:
- Robert Stephens, Founder, Geek Squad
- Jan Finken, President, IQ Marketing
- Patty Henderson, Interactive Director, Colle+McVoy
These same judges will judge the overnight website competition and award bragging rights to the winning team for its extraordinary online makeover. “These non-profits will get nearly 200 hours of professional web development services for the price of a good night’s sleep,” said Luke Bucklin, President of Sierra Bravo .
Non-profits and volunteer web pros will meet up Thursday evening at a pre-event gathering hosted by supporting sponsor New Horizons of Minnesota to discuss how non-profits can best utilize the time and talents of their dedicated team of eight volunteers.
New Horizons of Minnesota will donate free computer training to each participating non-profits. Presenting sponsor VISI will provide each of the participating non-profits one year of web hosting. In-kind sponsors include: Adobe, Buffalo Wild Wings, Chipotle, Peace Coffee, Red Bull.
Sierra Bravo Corporation is a custom software and web development company focused on helping organizations strengthen their business through technical solutions. Based in Bloomington, Minn., Sierra Bravo created the F1 Overnight Website Challenge to connect the nonprofit community with volunteer web professionals to help organizations work smarter on the web.
VISI is Minnesota's largest Internet hosting and connectivity provider and is located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. VISI offers customized services in four key areas – Web hosting, colocation, connectivity and consulting. For more information, visit www.visi.com .