We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Holly Schwab a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Holly, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

I started this organization after my oldest son, Zachary, went through cancer in 2008. Zach had a form of childhood cancer called Neuroblastoma. We were very fortunate to catch Zach’s cancer during a sick visit to his pediatrician. He had not had any symptoms of pain, but merely the sniffles. Zachary was just shy of 10 months old when we were given this devastating news. He went through a very hard surgery on March 4, 2008 to try and remove his tumor – but the surgeons could not remove it because of its size and location. Zachary had chemotherapy at the outpatient center, the Valvano Day Hospital. This is where I started noticing the clinic didn’t have anything for kids to do during treatment and the idea of Zach’s Toy Chest was planted. We had our first toy drive for Duke Children’s in the Fall of 2009.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers?

Before my son was sick, I was in corporate telecom. After Zach got better, I looked for a charity to support and could not find one that donated toys all year long. So I started one. I never saw myself running a nonprofit, but here I am, 13 years later. For several years I worked full time and did ZTC on the side and we grew a little each year. I was laid off in 2009 and used that time that I was not working to build ZTC and we got incorporated with the state of NC in 2011. In May 2014 we got our 501c3 so we could continue to grow. In 2016 I left my corporate job for good to stay home with Zach, Maverick and the new baby, Caroline. Shifting gears to become a stay at home Mom was a big change but allowed me to be with my kids and also focus more on Zach’s Toy Chest. With the help of my family, I was able to put more into ZTC and grow the nonprofit again. We started working with more hospitals in order to serve more kids. We’ve maintained this for several years and are growing again now. It’s an exciting time!

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Zach’s Toy Chest doesn’t have a huge following on social media, but we are growing. I manage all our social media accounts and do my best to post relevant information. We share stories of families we support, inspirational quotes, childhood cancer facts, toy sorting, toy donations and ways to volunteer. ZTC is on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube. We hope to continue to gain new supporters through these platforms and help keep creating awareness for the kids we serve.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Childhood cancer happened to our entire family. Having a baby that sick was traumatic and life changing. It would have been really easy to give in to negative thoughts once Zach was getting better to never look back at the hospital. Wanting to help others has always been something I love to do, and quite simply, it makes me feel good. I like being part of something so much bigger than myself. In the beginning, it started as a single toy drive to help kids at Duke Children’s. It snowballed into so much more due to me deciding to not turn my back on these kids. I was determined to fill the hospital with toys after our experience. Duke is top notch for medical care. What they were lacking were toys. That’s where I knew we could make a real difference in the overall care children receive while undergoing cancer treatments. We help them focus on play and childhood, not cancer, not being stuck at the hospital…not being sick. This is our goal and we’re making it happen every day.

Contact Info:

• Website: zachstoychest.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zachstoychest/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zachstoychest
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/zachstoychest/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/zachstoychest
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@zachstoychest09

Image Credits
Credit Zach’s Toy Chest for all pictures