Raging for a cause

Local organizer Risa Dickens (centre, with megaphone) throws Yelp Montreal
a party with the aim of helping 11 non-profit organizations
Photo by Darren Curtis of Actaeon Photo courtesy of Yelp

By now, most of us are familiar with Yelp, the site that offers user-penned reviews of all manner of businesses and services, from barbers to bail bondsmen.

Now 10 months old, the service’s local arm, Yelp Montreal, is off to a healthy start. Community manager Risa Dickens, who handles the English side of the site’s affairs, is throwing her baby a birthday party this Saturday, with the aim of helping 11 non-profit organizations.

Through Yelp Helps, an event held in conjunction with Pop Montreal and the Canadian Liver Foundation, it will treat its users to acrobats, installation art and food and drinks, all in the name of bringing awareness to groups like Santropol Roulant, Head and Hands and Apathy Is Boring.

But you need not be a die-hard Yelper to join the party.

Festivities will begin with a one-hour Yelp VIP meet ’n’ greet. Casual users can then explore the four-floor bistro and sample haute cuisine and fancy-drunk drinks. Black-and-white installation invaders En Masse will pass the ink bucket to any Yelper with artistic inclinations while Cirque acrobats get freaky. Santropol Roulant, meanwhile, will run a hot pepper roulette table as other local community groups add similar flavour to the evening.

And, of course, attendees will be able to donate to the organizations on hand.

“Yelp Montreal is about creating connections between locals and what’s great in our community, and Yelp Helps is my best possible expression of that,” says Dickens.

“I’m super honoured and excited to work with all these organizations full of people I look up to.” ■

At Les Deux Gamins (170 Prince Arthur E.) on Saturday, July 28, 3 p.m. (Elite Hour), 4-6 p.m. (Yelp Helps). For more information, and to RSVP for the Yelp Helps portion of the event, visit http://www.yelp.ca/events/montréal-yelp-helps-yelp-aide.