La Crosse firefighter becomes first to hit $500 limit on grocery shopping spree

Mike Marco’s strategy was “bigger is better,” which explains why he grabbed the 10-pound box of king crab legs first.

Marco got to sprint with shopping carts through the Quillin’s grocery store on Mormon Coulee Road in La Crosse on a $500 shopping spree Wednesday after winning a raffle for donating to the annual United Way fundraising campaign.

The La Crosse firefighter had two minutes to gather as much as he could.

He centered on the meat department, loading steaks, hamburger, turkey breasts and pork chops into two carts.

His final tally at checkout topped the $500 limit, making him the first to hit that mark in the event’s history, organizers said.

Marco was a good candidate to make a run at the record.

“I love to shop and love to cook,” he said.

He shops at the same Quillin’s about twice a week and had studied potential routes.

“They kept moving things, so I had to keep coming back,” he said.

Quillin’s has offered the shopping spree as a United Way raffle prize for more than five years, said Phil Quillin, owner and president. He was chairman of the United Way campaign in the early 1990s, he said.

“It’s a difficult job to raise that kind of money,” Quillin said of the United Way campaign. “It takes a lot of dedication of volunteers and staff.”