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- Written by: Matt Wilson - Breese Journal Reporter
Members of the Kharibian family pose for a photo — Gary holding Mick, Kelsie, with Kipp and Andi Jo in front. Members of the Tripp's Tribe organization gave a donation of 24 Owlets to HSHS St. Joseph's Hospital in Breese on Friday, April 3.
Tripp's Tribe is a non-profit organization that was formed after Gary and Kelsie Kharibian lost their son Tripp to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome on April 4, 2019. The donation of Owlets came a day before the annual anniversary of Tripp's angel day.
The Owlets were a gift from Tripp's Tribe and are intended to be given to families whose babies may be at higher risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome due to financial hardship or medical conditions.
An Owlet is a baby monitoring product.
The goal of Tripp's Tribe is to provide breathing monitors to Clinton County and Highland day care facilities, and they have now expanded to hospitals. The goal is to offer peace of mind, safety and support to caregivers/parents so more families can rest easier while their little ones sleep.
After Tripp passed away at day care, Gary and Kelsie wanted to find a way to keep Tripp's legacy living on.
"For us, getting the Owlets and getting them into all of the local day cares was the first step for us," Gary said. "We had a golf tournament, which was awesome to help raise some money and keep his legacy living on. It has always been important to us to keep his legacy going on and doing good through the community through his life."
The day care facilities were the first round of people to get the Owlets. They have expanded to families who are in financial hardship or any families who know that when they have their baby, there are going to be preexisting conditions.
"Any child who might be going home not as healthy as the other child are our criteria for who receives the Owlets," Gary said.
Tripp's Tribe has given out more than 200 Owlets or Snuza monitors.
The Kharibians will replenish the Owlets when HSHS staff gets low.
Tripp's Tribe has a partnership through Owlet’s foundation program. The program has many organizations like Tripp's Tribe throughout the country.
"Owlet has been a really firm partner in helping us provide this through Tripp's Tribe," Gary said.
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- Written by: Matt Wilson - Breese Journal Reporter
Excel Bottling in Breese has a new seasonal clear soda called Freedom Punch. Photo by Matt Wilson Excel Bottling Company in Breese is celebrating America's 250th birthday with a special Freedom Punch soda.
Freedom Punch was labeled and bottled on Monday, April 6. It hit the stores on Tuesday, April 7.
"We like to do a seasonal soda every year," Excel Bottling Company president Bill Meier said. "We want to do something just to get the people excited."
In the past, Excel has done an eclipse soda and a soda commemorating the moon landing.
"The 250th birthday of the United States is a big deal," Meier said. "I'm old enough to remember the bi-centennial."
Meier said they are trying to introduce their new sodas being a little more functional and healthier. They have always used pure cane sugar, but over the past couple of years they have started to take off the artificial dyes and replace them with natural dyes.
They wanted to make the Freedom Punch soda so it could be used at July 4 events, so that dictated that it needed to be a plastic bottle so that people could have it at picnics.
Freedom Punch is a clear soda that does not include any dye. It includes some Vitamin C.
"There are not too many punch sodas out there," Meier said. "We wanted to be all natural and not have any dyes."
Excel Bottling did a small run of Freedom Punch with around 500 cases.
"Hopefully people will enjoy it and it will give us some marketing data as to how clear soda goes," Meier said.
Excel Bottling worker Carla Baublitz said they have gotten some feedback on Facebook while they have been experimenting with natural colors.
"Some people said 'Why add any color?," Baublitz said. "This will be our first time trying that idea."
They already have a couple of orders, including from some picnics, for Freedom Punch.
Freedom Punch will first be in CC Food Marts and will be in most of the independent stores around the area. It also will be in Rural King.
"We made up some sample batches early in and it tasted really good," Meier said. "For the last 10 years, we have done new projects, and some have done well. Eclipse soda took off and we were on the Today Show. You just never know. With a small company, you just have to throw darts and hope every once in a while, something will stick and it will tell us more about our consumers."
Excel Bottling is a family run bottling and brewing company started in 1936. It remains one of the few independent family bottlers in the nation and is the only returnable bottling line remaining in Illinois.
