Five Hole For Food in Austin with HootSuite

Take a bunch of Canadians, set them down in Texas and a hockey game just might break out. Five Hole For Food in partnership with Vancouver’s hottest startup, HootSuite, hosted a charity street hockey game in Austin at South by Southwest (“SXSW”) on Sunday, March 10, 2013.

John Bollwitt and Richard Loat setup the nets

They took the Five Hole formula — playing pick-up games of street hockey in communities while collecting donations for the local food banks — and hosted company teams, the Dallas Stars Ice Girls, Texas Stars players, and heavy-hitters in the tech realm like Guy Kawasaki for the afternoon.

Some of the teams who came out to play

The HootBus (HootSuite’s shuttle bus here in Austin for the SXSW conference) delivered players while the Dallas Stars community team setup a fantastic arena (with inflatable boards) in the parking lot of a church on 9th and Trinity. The Capital Area Food Bank of Texas was on hand to collect monetary and non-perishable food item donations from players and spectators.

Five Hole for Food team members, including founder Richard Loat, have traveled coast to coast across Canada playing summer street hockey for several years and this was their first event in the USA. Richard reported on Facebook that they raised the equivalent of 7,500lbs of food for the Capital Area Food Bank, making the campaign in Austin quite the success.

Team HootSuite with Guy Kawasaki and mascot, Owly

Canadians have been making a splash at SXSW for years, with innovative individuals, ideas, and companies, but this is the first time that they’ve brought sticks, nets, and supported the local food bank. Follow Five Hole for Food on Twitter and Facebook to see where they’ll be facing off next and for more information about their Canadian tour this summer.