By Tim Mastro

MILTON — To attract first-time blood donors, free food or drink specials has proven to be a good place to start.

For Dawn Kenton of Milford, what got her hooked was homemade cheese salad sandwiches. She began donating blood with her sorority at Shepherd University in West Virginia during the mid-1980s.

The donation center would provide finger sandwiches for all the donors, and Ms. Kenton said so many people clamored for those cheese salad sandwiches.

“That’s the one of the main reasons I actually kept giving in college.” Ms. Kenton chuckled. “Oh my gosh, those were amazing.

More than 30 years later, Ms. Kenton donates blood whenever she can.

She rolled up her sleeve once again last week as the Blood Bank of Delmarva kicked off its Blood for a Brew Tour at Revelation Beer Garden at Hudson Fields. All who donated received a coupon for $2 off a drink at one of the participating Blood for a Brew Tour venues. The coupon cannot be used on the same day of donation. BBD does not recommend consuming alcohol the same day as donating blood.

Breweries and establishments back for the second straight year of the tour include Revelation, Dogfish Head, Big Oyster Brewery, Tall Tales, Crooked Hammock, Two Stones Pub and Camp Adventureland. Liquid Alchemy Beverages is new to the tour this year.

In the inaugural year of the tour in 2021, almost 25% of donors were first-timers, which was double the amount in mobile drives during the same time period, BBD executive director Patricia Killeen said.

“It’s so exciting because our donor base is shrinking,” Ms. Killeen said. “So the majority of our donors who had been with us for years, they just do it because they’ve done it for so long. We get a lot of our new donors from colleges and high schools. With COVID, those drives have really been decreased and so that opportunity to engage the young new donor has been really difficult. So when we see them coming in, it’s hope. You hope that they’re going to take you on as a cause, that they’re going to continue to make this a passion and participate for the future and spread the word.”

The average age of the 2021 Blood for a Brew Tour donor was nine years younger than other BBD mobile drives during the same time period. The program represented 10% of mobile donors from June 1 to Aug. 27, 2021.

BBD is currently in a blood emergency after spring breaks and holiday travel caused drop in donations over the past two months.

Ms. Killeen said the blood supply stands at a two- or three-day level, with type O negative and O positive fluctuating below a one-day level at times. The ideal inventory, she said, would be a seven-day supply.

To make an appointment, donors can call 1-888-8-BLOOD-8 or visit here.

Ms. Kenton said donating blood is not a scary process.

“You get a really great feeling, knowing that you’re helping somebody,” she said. “My stepson is in the fire department and I think about that every time he’s out and someone is hurt. Maybe my blood could potentially be used somewhere like that to help someone.”