More Than 755 Volunteers Will Help Heat-A- Home, Shaking Their Cans & Aprons During the 25th Silver Anniversary of the Annual Hardee’s “Rise and Shine For Heat Day” Benefit, Valentine’s Day, Friday, February 14th During Breakfast

Since its inception almost 25 years ago, Heatupstlouis.org and Heatupmissouri.org have partnered with the local Hardee’s restaurants in the greater St. Louis Metropolitan area. “Have a Heart. Heat A Home” campaign kicked off in January with a Pre-Order campaign where area clubs, companies and civic groups are able to purchase 25 or more Sausage biscuits or Egg biscuits at a special price of $1.00 each via HeatupStlouis.Org only. That special fundraiser ends on Thursday, at Noon on Valentine’s Eve, February 13. 

It is Hardee’s “Rise and Shine for Heat Day” on February 14, Valentine’s Day from 6-10:30 a.m., at area participating Hardee’s in Illinois and Missouri. Ameren, Commerce Bank and Hardee’s are corporate sponsors and Spire is a co-sponsor. Hardee’s has continued to donate for the past 25 years egg biscuits and sausage biscuit products to the charitable cause. So, 100% of those proceeds will go to Heatupstlouis.org and its Illinois and Missouri partners.

Meanwhile the general public can drop off a dollar or more and receive a Hardee’s made-from-scratch sausage biscuit or egg biscuit for one dollar each on Valentine’s Day. While purchasing the biscuit product from Hardee’s team members, the 755 volunteers will be spread throughout the St. Louis region taking up extra dough (tips) including cash or checks payable to the charity. 100% of all combined funds collected that day would go to Heat-Up St. Louis and some of its partnering Illinois and Missouri charities. Despite any rain, sleet or snow the project will continue.

The St. Louis local media are invited to do live news breaks with many newsmakers, who are volunteers of Heatupstlouis.org. After Friday, Hardee’s will continue to take canister donations and round-up donations throughout the day through Monday, February 17. Those combined efforts along with major check presentations from area entities combined will go towards the overall results. Both Ameren, Spire, Affordable Housing Trust fund, Anthem and Commerce Bank and others will also be making significant contributions during Rise and Shine Day.

Heat-Up St. Louis has impacted the lives of about 1.8 million people throughout Missouri and Illinois and raised millions. Hardee’s annual regionwide fundraiser alone has raised more than $5 million from substantial gifts, and from the sales of Hardee’s sausage biscuits and egg biscuits. Since its inception the charity has received in donations about $50 million. The not-for-profit, public education and advocacy charity also has taken note that need knows no geographic boundaries.

January 2025 has been bitter cold accentuated with thick ice and deep snow in many parts of Missouri and Illinois. This extreme weather has driven-up utility usage. This is causing many fixed incomes, seniors and the physically and now the working class to cut back on necessities. When usage becomes abnormally high, so does utility bills. February has given Missouri and Illinois residents some relief of warmer temperatures, and a chance to catch up on their past due utility bills or a chance to review their tight home financial budgets. 

Extreme weather, Inflation and affordability still represent a struggling pocketbook. This adds overall to a public health and safety crisis for hundreds of seniors, people with disabilities, working poor and those with median incomes, who live paycheck-to-paycheck. The cost of natural gas and electricity is still a challenge for some area households. Heatupstlouis.org works with Ameren and Spire Energy to help change the landscape related to affordability with aggressive positive utility programs and projects to ensure that rate payers have options to keep down the cost of their monthly utility bills.

In addition, hundreds of heads of households may not qualify for federal funds or may need additional funding. That is where the annual Hardee’s Rise and Shine donors come in because there are less application barriers. The economy and weather conditions are so turbulent, Heat-Up St. Louis fear more families sliding off the safety net to borderline homelessness or emotional despair. The high demand for utility assistance since November has risen to about a 58% increase versus last winter heating season. Heatupstlouis.org continues to work with its utility partners of additional ways to help the ratepayers shore up their household expenses related to energy. 

100% of all proceeds will stay in the communities where funds were collected to keep neighbors in need warm, for instance in the bi-state area, as far away as Jefferson, Lincoln, Pike, and Warren counties in Missouri, and Madison and St. Clair counties in Illinois and other Missouri counties, including St. Charles, and St. Louis County, and the City of St. Louis. Some partners are Urban League Metropolitan St. Louis, CAASTLC, Northeast Community Action Agencies, Sal Army, Catholic Urban Programs, and St. Vincent DePaul, just to mention a few.

“This is a media neutral event, and community outreach annual program where the St. Louis media has made a significant contribution to ensuring that those without a primary heating source or those being threatened with utility disconnections get the help they need,” said Ben Turec board president of Heatupstlouis.org. “Often some area heads of households do not qualify for federal, state, or local funds, so the Rise and Shine resources become an economic lifeline. This is why it is so important to ensure that funds from events such as Rise and Shine are bundled with other funding sources, to help drive down extremely high energy bills.”

“Wintertime has the highest incidents of home and apartment fires because some people attempt to use unsafe methods of heating their homes,” said St. Louis Fire Chief Dennis Jenkerson, and bi-state chair of the Health and Safety Committee at Heatupstlouis.org, also representing the Fire Chiefs Association of Greater St. Louis. “It’s important to work with the utilities and keep your primary home heating source connected, especially during the extreme weather where temperature hit some very dangerous lows.’ 

Earlier this winter there were some unnecessary home and apartment fires. Some due to the use of unsafe methods of heating, etc. Heaters should not be used as primary heating sources because they are not safe and not cost-effective. 

Area civic, business, religious, first-responders, media and civic leaders have been invited to contribute to this year’s event and serve as community hosts at area participating Hardee’s shaking their canisters. The media will receive the names of those spokespersons in advance of their appearances at area local participating Hardee’s in Illinois and Missouri.

After Monday, February 17, anyone can make a secure donation with a scan from public service spots; or by dropping off a donation to any teller, at Commerce Bank via a check or money order payable to Heat-Up St. Louis and online at Heatupstlouis.org. The 67 all-volunteer board of directors underwrite all administration costs, so all public donations go directly to servicing the needy of Missouri and Illinois residents who qualify.

In 1999, Heat-Up St. Louis’ mission was being drafted by Attorney John Fox Arnold, as a public education, advocacy, and utility assistance charity for Gentry Trotter. The Internal Revenue Service then granted a not-for-profit status in 2000, because of the proposed needs being significant, at the time. The first fundraising effort was selling donated hats from the Bee Hat Building on Washington Avenue as a charity. Hardee’s joined the ‘Rise and Shine for Heat” project, almost 10 years prior to the birth of Heat-Up St. Louis, a charity (Heatupstlouis.org). Hardee’s was using the campaign across the United States to help many of its existing local community charities.