A huge crowd turned out Tuesday, December 20th at Odie’s to play trivia and find out who would be the winner of the 2016 Un-Wrap Soldotna $1,000 shopping spree. “It was a great night!” said Soldotna Chamber of Commerce executive director Tami Murray, “We are piggy backing on the success that Megan Schaafsma, owner of Odie’s has had with their weekly trivia night which has exploded in popularity every Wednesday night. We have benefited from that with our annual trivia night where we have prizes and draw the Un-Wrap Soldotna winner. Rhonda McCormick is our trivia guru and I think she loses sleep coming up with the original questions.” From the 23 some teams that entered the Chambers trivia night it was Keith Randall with team “Slightly Above Average” that ended up on top and claimed the cash. “It’s our goal to be slightly above average and that’s name we use when we come here to Odie’s to regularly play trivia,” said Randall, whose winning team split $98.00 cash and $100 Chamber bucks for their efforts, “This was great fun and a great way to support local businesses and the Chamber, we’ll be back to defend our title for sure,” he said.

The lucky winner of the $1,000 Soldotna Bucks shopping spree was local resident Laurie Kemph who wasn’t present at trivia night, but later told the Dispatch, “It was a huge surprise! I’ve never won anything like this before and I want to thank the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce and all the participating vendors and businesses. It was just one day that I went around to many of the stores I regularly shop at and dropped in my name at Sweeney’s, Odie’s, Soldotna Professional Pharmacy, Susan’s Bath & Body, Sportsmen’s Warehouse and Beemun’s and only entered once at those six shops, some were on my shopping list but others nearby where I was I went into just enter, so I felt really lucky to have won. We love to support our local community all year long,” said Laurie who has lived here for more than 30 years. Kemph said they were not in need of a major $1,000 purchase so she spread the Soldotna bucks around to friends and family who she felt would have a very merry time shopping locally too.

Activities will not be slowing down in the New Year with the Soldotna Chamber 58th Annual Awards Luncheon on the calendar for Tuesday, January 10th at the Soldotna Regional Sports Complex. RSVP’s must be in by January 6th for the popular event and the coming January 28th are the Peninsula Winter Games with family fun for everyone. For more information go to www.visitsoldotna.com.