For the past 12 years, the Zeta Tau Alpha (ZTA) sorority chapter at Georgia Southern University has been selling strawberries in the spring to raise money for breast cancer awareness and education.

“We raised a lot last year and succeeded our goal. We try to raise the goal higher every year and we have been successfully reaching these goals,” Bailey Poage, strawberry sales coordinator, said.

According to Poage this year’s sale goal is $16,000.

The strawberries are sold in flats for $18 and can be preordered through a ZTA member.

The pick up date is Saturday, March 8 in the Hanner Fieldhouse parking lot.

“Majority of the sales comes from pre-orders. Last year we bought around two thousand one hundred flats and two thousand of them were pre-ordered,” Poage said.

The sale has been put on every year since 2002 and ZTA’s selection of selling strawberries instead of something else is not random.

All of the members of the sorority are actively involved in all aspects of the sale.

“We all participate by selling twelve flats of strawberries each. It is a great way to get to know local people and to get the ZTA’s name out and I think it is successful because every year more people look forward to it and we continue growing in fundraising,” Jesse Barry, freshman ZTA member, said.

Every year the advertising for the sale increases. It has been advertised by all of the members and through flyers, Northland Cable and signs around Statesboro.

“It is cool everyone knows us for this event. I was wearing a Zeta shirt at the baseball game and sold a flat to random lady who asked me about it in the bathroom,” Poage said. “The same thing happened to another member in Walmart.”

The strawberries come from Wish Farms located in Plant City, Fl. A former GSU ZTA’s family owns the farm.