Jumbo Bites bring in big bucks for Longhorns

By Lethbridge Herald on October 11, 2025.

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman
Lethbridge Herald

Excite Lethbridge provided the Lethbridge Longhorns with a cheque for $18,000 on Friday from Whoop-Up Days proceeds as they took part of the Jumbo Bites program.  

Paul Kingsmith, director for event development with Excite Lethbridge, said it was exciting to be able to provide such a significant contribution to their baseball program. 

He said the program members deserve it after working so hard to prepare, deliver, sell, and serve the jumbo bites during Whoop-Up Days. 

“Even with the change this year from Jumbo Ears to Jumbo Bites, we saw an uptake in sales, which meant a larger donation to their program than we were able to do last year,” said Kingsmith. 

Josh Burgmann, program director for the Lethbridge Longhorn high school baseball academy, received the cheque and said the donation is going to go a long way. 

“The big trip that we do with our young guys is that they go down to the U.S., to Arizona and it gives them exposure to U.S. colleges to try and chase their dreams of playing college baseball, and this money goes a long way to help them achieve that.”

With Spitz Stadium as their home field, the Longhorns’ goal is to support high end young talent, developing team members into great citizens, players, and students who are destined to play collegiate ball in the United States and Canada.

Burgmann said it’s important for the players to get involved with the community, as Lethbridge does so much for them. By taking part of the Jumbo Bites program, they were able to give back. 

“It was a grind, but they enjoyed doing it together. They loved interacting with the public, so I think it’s huge even for our young guys to learn how to interact with adults and children, as that gives them a life lesson as well.”

The Longhorns weren’t the only organization that benefited from the event. This year, more than 50 local organizations took part in Whoop-Up Days, from being community booth participants in the Marketplace to hosting community events, to volunteering time to the event.

New this year was the Community Booth program in the Whoop-Up Days Marketplace. Local charities, not-for-profits, agriculture commodity groups and other organizations were given the opportunity to have free booth space in the marketplace to showcase the work they do in the community. This gave more than 30 organizations an opportunity to connect with the nearly 55,000 visitors who attended Whoop-Up Days in 2025.