buncee.com is essentially like an e-card site but amped up a bit. The site lets you create anything from e-greetings to ads for your business, school lesson plans, slide-shows, digital scrapbooks and more in a very personalized way. Given the special, handmade nature of these creations, we at buncee would like to send Valentine’s Day ‘buncees’ to our troops overseas, and would also like to introduce this wonderful, unique way for military families to send greetings and personalized messages to their loved ones.
Since the site was designed to be used by everyone, no matter the skill level, personalized buncee’s are easy to make, by simply adding design elements to a background like personal photos, clipart, drawings, YouTube videos, or audio, your buncee creation can then be shared privately over e-mail or publicly on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and others.
A few of us at buncee are a part of military families and know firsthand that deployments are difficult for families, not only for the obvious fact that we are separated from our Marine, Soldier, Airman, or Sailor for months, sometimes years at a time, or that we pray every day that they are safe and return home to us the same way they left us, but also because they miss out on the everyday things in life. Whether it be their son’s first t-ball game, the birth of their child, their little girl’s dance recital, the list goes on and on. The importance of making our troops feel like they are a part of our daily lives even if they aren’t physically here with us is key. Facebook and Motomail are great ways to keep in touch, and sending snail mail letters and care packages is always a treat for our brave Service Members; however, we think buncee can help military families share interactive greetings, family updates, memories, and simple “pick me up’s” to our troops that are more personalized than traditional online sites and without having to go to the Post Office and without the 2+week wait for a mail drop in theater.
Our small team here in Long Island believes passionately in the power of a buncee because it’s whole mission is based on enabling fun and meaningful online communication, all while supporting a good cause! The CEO of buncee, Marie Arturi, lost her 7 month old daughter, Daniella, to a very rare red blood disease called Diamond Blackfan Anemia (DBA). The year after Daniella died, Marie and her husband, Manny, founded the Daniella Maria Arturi Foundation in their daughter’s name and it has been their quest to find a cure. Instead of sitting back and asking for handouts, Marie and Manny spent much of their own hard earned money to host medical conferences, fundraisers, and finally, 2 years ago, started buncee.com; their hope is that buncee will be a way for people to communicate more creatively and personally, and in turn, they hope it may also help generate funds for the Foundation’s efforts to support research for the cure for DBA.
We hope that you find the site and concept useful, and that you see its potential as a creative outlet for children to contact their mom or dad overseas, for a military spouse to send a “just thinking of you and missing you” message, or simply a way to share a video and message with a loved one so they feel like they are still a part of your everyday life. In a few weeks, we will be sending Valentine’s to our own family members overseas, and we would be delighted to help anyone else who would like to do the same – be it a single military family or a community campaign. We would be honored to help because we sincerely believe that with buncee, families can be closer, memories can be shared, and we pray that in the end, a cure for this rare disease will be found, too.
The Deployment Diatribes 