The Rutland community just wouldn’t be the same without Peggy Speer.
The owner of Curves Rutland location, Peggy and an army of curvettes have been combining forces to make the area a better place to live and to help out those in need since she first started working at Curves in 2003 before buying the franchise in 2007.
Her gym is not only a place where women come and get a workout in a happy place, they put their minds together to raise money for a variety of causes, helping out those around the community.
“I’m the one who usually initiates it but we are a community,” says Peggy. “We’re all part of the community and my members are so kind and they want to be part of it. I love to help people. And they love to help me help people.”
One of the big causes that Peggy and her curvettes like to work towards is Rutland’s very own food bank. Run out of the Kelowna Christian Centre, the Rutland Food Bank provides help for people who can’t find their way downtown to the larger Kelowna food bank.
To help provide food and the necessities to people who need them, Speer raises money in her gym, selling jewelry and holding a once a year bake, craft and harvest sale, raising over $1,000 each year for the food bank.
Another cause close to her heart is the Heart and Stroke Foundation. Peggy and her curvettes take part in the foundation’s big bike ride and for two years have won a defibrillator because of the amount they raised. In the past two years they have raised some $22,000 for the foundation.
One of the life-saving units is at Curves while Speer donated the other one to the Army, Navy Air Force Veterans chapter in Rutland.
A portion of each enrolment fee at her gym is also donated to the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation.
Peggy says a lot of the credit has to go to her members, who regularly join her in her fundraising ideas. They are competitive and want to keep raising the bar when it comes to fundraising.
“You feel better when you are helping the community,” she says. “I have lived here for a long time and people come here to support my business so absolutely, I want to give back. I’m around a lot of people and I have a lot of friends who are generous and who live in the community and want to help.”
