Fireworks sales help aid local church

CLINTON — After missing last year’s Fourth of July celebration due to COVID, members of The Apostolic Church are finally back in their usual spot at the Walmart parking lot in Clinton for the church’s annual fireworks sale.

It is a longtime event that has been ongoing for more than two decades, part of the church’s fundraising efforts.

“We’ve been doing this with our church since back in 2000, right here in Clinton — I think that’s when we started,” said William McDaniel from Apostolic Church, located on Lorraine Road, Clinton.

“We’ve only every taken one year off, plus last year when we weren’t able to do it,” he continued. “But, aside from that we’ve run it every year since then and this year will make roughly our 22nd time doing this, I believe.”

The Apostolic Church teams up with TNT Fireworks, which has been around for 100 years and provides the church with the products they sell. The church sets up shop, sells the product and nets a percentage of the proceeds.

“This is our only retail fundraiser that we have a year. We come out and do this here and it keeps us from having to do small plate sales and things like that throughout the whole year,” said McDaniel. “That way we can do other things for fun, like our street fair, where we do our little BBQ Cook-off and things like that, but this is our main fundraiser every year.”

The event is just about an all-day affair for days leading up the Fourth of July, as they start selling in the early mornings and stay around until late at night and it runs just over a week.

“We are open from nine in the morning until 10 or 11 at night, by the time we leave here it’s dark out,” McDaniel said. “We are out here all day, through rain or shine. If it rains, we drop the flaps, but we’re still open. If it’s during those hours, we’re going to be open — it doesn’t matter. And we are usually out here for about eight days.”

McDaniel also pointed out that if your fireworks are no good, they’ve got replacements for customers free of charge.

“I know there are some other people around trying to sell some fireworks too, but we offer a no-dud guarantee,” he said. “If you come in and something doesn’t finish like it’s suppose to or whatever, they can bring it back because we’ve got that no-dud guarantee with this company here.”

For those at Apostolic Church, this fundraiser is also about connecting with the community.

“We enjoy being out here — we get more excited about being out here to meet and talk to the people than we do the money,” McDaniel said. “We look forward to this every year and were devastated last year by not being able to do it. I missed it so bad I rode around last year and asked other people if they needed help since we didn’t have our tent.”

“This is just a passion we have and it’s a way that we can reach our community,” he added.