By Lemor Abrams | CBS47.tv
James Caples always envisioned himself reviving the breakfast scene in Fresno.
But the inspiration for his business has little to do with his culinary expertise.
Instead, it comes from the worst tragedy ever to hit his family: the sudden death of his 3-month old daughter Caylie.
“She fell asleep for a nap and never woke up. It was a SIDS death,” he said referring to “Sudden Infant Death Syndrome,” which kills about 2500 infants younger than 1 each year, according to the CDC.
When James and his wife Natalie put Caylie to rest last fall, James had an epiphany.
“That kind of uncertainty in life leads you think of the things you’d do someday… and decide that maybe someday isn’t really a good goal. Maybe there needs to be a more definite goal so we’d always planned on opening our own food truck… in Fresno,” James said.
“You take things for granted. The fact that you think people are going to be around forever, and they’re not…” Natalie said.
Together they would offer Fresno a unique dining experience: “The Benaddiction Food Truck,” giving Fresno “Rockin” Breakfast options as sweet as their 2 1/2 year old girl Chloe.
James turned to Kickstarter.com, a website designed to fund projects through online donations.
A family friend became one of 74 backers…
“We all need to help take care of each other… help each other out. That’s where good things come from,” said Cara Modaffari.
In just a couple days, James received more than $7,000 in donations from locals and people out of state. Now he needs to raise $13,000 to buy the food truck. And he hopes to do it before Caylie’s birthday… July 27th. She would’ve turned one.
“You can always say someday but sometimes someday never comes so the specific time we decided to set was Caylie’s birthday… we want to honor her memory and make sure we’ve done something great.
If you’d like to help visit Benaddiction.com or click on our link to Kickstarter.com.
James even rewarded one donor with a free weekend breakfast.
