ADESA president John Hammer is serious about helping with the fight against type 1 diabetes. He notes that about 40,000 people in the U.S. will be newly diagnosed with the disease, “potentially impacting some of our employees, customers, and their family members," he said.

“That’s why we take our fundraising partnerships with Emkay and the Ford Global Action Team seriously,” he continued in a news release. ADESA and those two partner companies raised $210,546 in support of type 1 diabetes research funding organization JDRF last year. Together, these partnerships have raised more than $1.5 million since 2011 for JDRF, which describes itself as the largest charitable supporter of type 1 diabetes research.

“It’s with their support and the generosity of our customers and employees that we are able to make a significant impact on funding for diabetes awareness and research,” Hammer said.

That’s good news for JDRF, which has a research mission to discover, develop, and deliver advances that cure, better treat, and prevent type 1 diabetes.

Many individual ADESA auction locations have been involved in the project. During a nine-month campaign between March 1 and Nov. 30, 2018, EMKAY and ADESA each made matching donations generated across 21 participating ADESA auction locations. This campaign raised $67,220 for JDRF, taking the seven-year fundraising partnership total to $334,220.

Individual auction locations have also taken the fund-raising efforts to a friendly-rivalry level. A group of the auctions compete each year for the honor of raising the most money for JDRF. The ADESA Buffalo location in Akron, N.Y., led the 2018 results with $35,997 raised overall.

In 2018, the Ford Global Action Team’s involvement helped result in some serious fundraising power in the fight against diabetes. That year, ADESA and the Ford Global Action Team hosted special fundraising events at six ADESA locations in support of JDRF. That campaign collected $143,326, increasing the seven-year fundraising partnership total to $1,173,831.

ADESA is serious about other charitable causes, as well.

For the eighth consecutive year at the NADA Show, ADESA will host a charity auction benefitting the NADA Foundation and Canine Companions for Independence. This year’s auction item is a Yamaha golf cart. The auction will take place at ADESA’s booth (#621 South) at 1 p.m. on Jan. 26, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

NADA noted that to date, ADESA’s auctions at the NADA Show have raised $384,000 for the NADA Foundation, which supports Canine Companions.