The Bears on Tuesday brought an old-school neighborhood feel to training camp with a lemonade stand, manned by chairman George H. McCaskey, President & CEO Kevin Warren and general manager Ryan Poles.
The Lovely Lemon — a pop-up lemonade company based in Sycamore, Ill. — brought the stand to the Bears' open practice. For the first hour of camp, fans enjoyed free lemonade courtesy of The Lovely Lemon, which was served by Warren, McCaskey and Poles. Visitors were also encouraged to donate to Bears Care — the organization's charitable arm — after enjoying their drinks.
"This is the lifeblood of this organization — our fans," Warren said. "We have the greatest fans in all of sports and to be able to have interactions with them is special. There was one woman who came up and she was pregnant; she said she already had a Bears fan on board. Our focus has always been able to go from 1 year old to 110 years old, so it is awesome to be able to have interactions with them, especially alongside Ryan and George."
McCaskey, Warren and Poles were joined by former safety Gary Fencik – who sits on Bears Care's board of directors – former defensive tackle Anthony "Spice" Adams and team reporter Lauren Screeden.
The entire group spent the hour not only helping run the lemonade stand, but also taking pictures, signing autographs and helping fans make lifelong memories.
Poles said one of the best interactions he had was meeting a father and his son who traveled to Halas Hall all the way from Florida just to watch the Bears practice. Poles added that it was "great to see the kids and their excitement for the team."
Brian Pennington — a lifelong Bears fan — and his 4-year-old son AJ were some of the first customers at The Lovely Lemon's stand. Pennington said the experience was completely unexpected and called it "a dream come true for me and eventually, a dream come true for AJ."
"It was awesome to have AJ meet all those guys," Pennington said. "I actually met George — and I call him George because I called him Mr. McCaskey at a game last year and he was quick to say, 'I'm not Mr. McCaskey, I'm George.'"
"So it was great seeing the chairman and introducing him to AJ. I don't think AJ realizes yet, but when he gets older and we have these pictures, it's gonna be awesome."
Jessalin Volmer, ao-owner of The Lovely Lemon, called the experience at training camp "a blast." She bonded with McCaskey over sharing a hometown of Sycamore and was thrilled to see him hand out lemonade and spend extra time with fans.
"It's amazing," Volmer said. "Growing up as Bears fans, to be here, it's nothing we ever thought for our business. We're really looking forward to hopefully other opportunities here. We just love the Bears and we're so thankful we were asked to come out here."
