INTRODUCTION
Welcome to our second year of operation of our Make It Better Benefit. The "Make it Better" campaign will kick off again this month as we look to help out several charity groups throughout 2009. We hope to conduct the benefits quarterly, and look to add to our near thousand dollar total from last year. We hope this year is brighter than last and more can afford to contribute. We're going to do our part to make it hard not to want to get involved!

In the meantime we ask our readership to participate in the program, and you could be doing something that is making a difference, to those who didn’t have the chance otherwise. Star Wars collectors can be a very generous group and have a lot of heart. We're asking you all to continue to help in this unprecedented effort. We have very personal reasons at the heart for donating to these groups. We have taken part in past charity functions, but we really wanted to raise the bar and year-round awareness and do our best in 2009 to reach out and Make It Better.

We’ll donate to the following groups in the name of:

Our first Make It Better effort will be conducted through Sandtroopers.com and we are looking to expand on more than just one lucky winner! We will once again ask members to donate only four dollars to enter to win a chance at a Gentle Giant Galactic Marine mini-bust autographed by Karl Meyer at the Forbidden Planet event in 2008. We are also offering a few runner-up prizes of a Force Unleashed TK Commander (Game Stop exclusive)  and the team at Sideshow Collectibles was kind enough to donate a 12-inch Sandtrooper for this effort as well. The winner of the Sandtrooper will have to wait until Sidshow has the item in stock. We also ask that they make note of this in the terms and conditions. We also have one more prize to reveal in the form of a superb Boba Fett "Legacy" giclee print from our friends at ACME Archives! We are also looking for a couple more surprises to make it even BETTER for those who are taking the time to donate .

We'll be doing our part by linking our Make It Better scroll to our front page to raise 24 hour a day awareness. We will also be rotating the groups every quarter and offering up a great prize for those of you who want a chance at winning. If we have future guests in our bunker, we'll also ask that a donation of the proceeds are directed towards one of the groups. We hope each and everyone of you can do your part to help us make it better!

HOW DO I DONATE?
We ask our members to donate four dollars for entry and all proceeds will be sent to the Sturge-Weber foundation. We will begin accepting donations on January 19, 2009 and select the winners on February 28, 2009. We can only hope more people donating can lead to a cure. We have added a post office box where you can mail your donations in the event you do not have a paypal account or would like to maximize your donations!

Account Name = benefit@sandtroopers.com

OR

Sandtroopers Entertainment
PO Box 171
Winthrop Harbor, IL
60096-0171

NOTE: Four dollars is the minimum suggested donation. If you'd like to donate more than the suggested four dollar amount, please directly email benefit@sandtroopers.com the exact amount you choose to donate. We thank you again for going the extra mile. Entries must be received by Saturday February, 28th 2009 to be eligible for the drawing that evening.

SPECIAL THANKS
We’d like to thank Karen Ball (Sturge-Weber Foundation), Biffa Quantz (Make-a-Wish), and Floyd Grimm (a.k.a. TK-9907) for letting us use photos of him wearing his customized Red Cross armor. And last but certainly not least George Lucas. I’d like to borrow a quote from a letter he sent to the 501st Legion recently, which inspired this campaign. "We exemplify one of the greatest messages in the Star Wars films – that one person’s devotion to a greater good can make a difference. May we all collectively and individually continue to make that difference." We can only hope to put those words to use in our Make It Better Campaign.

United We Find!