Ironbridge & Severn Gorge Lions Club
Fundraising Report to AGM – April 2018
This report is not intended as a financial breakdown of funds raised throughout the year, rather, it is a simple summary of our Club’s fundraising activities and associated involvement in our community.
My past history with Lions is primarily associated with fundraising and so, when I joined Ironbridge Lions in May 2017, I naturally gravitated to the fundraising activities of the Club. It was a pleasant surprise to have become associated with such a busy and ambitious Club, and to work alongside June who initially mentored me on the Club’s fundraising ways.
June was very busy as Club Secretary and It became obvious that she needed a rest from leading the fundraising activities as well, so I offered to take Fundraising on.
It has taken me some time to ‘get in to the groove’ and I am grateful for all the advice and help I’ve been given during this learning curve.
As I said, it’s a busy Club but it’s with a relatively small membership, which means that, on occasions, there can be a lot of pressure on only a few shoulders. It is fortunate indeed that we have so many reliable ‘FRIENDS’ to help out when we are struggling for numbers, and we are truly indebted to them.
Activities (in rough chronological order)
Silver Over the Bridge
I’m a believer in ‘keeping it simple’ and have been fascinated by the ingenuity and simplicity of this. Whoever dreamt it up deserves a medal as it provides such a regular and reliable source of income for the charitable causes we support. The secret lies in enjoying a constant stream of new visitors who come to visit our UNESCO World Heritage Site and who are endlessly generous.
We were generally quite fortunate with the weather over the summer of 2017 and collected funds for eight worthy causes.
Dawley Day & Oakengates Carnival
These provide a great opportunity to interact with our local community and raise money at the same time. We are able to include a variety of stalls including Tombola, Beat the Goalie, Noisy Balloons etc.
With any luck we can provide an even greater presence at this year’s events.
V-Fest
Though not strictly a fundraising event for our Club, it gave us the opportunity assist in collecting tents for international aid and also a variety of tents and equipment that we could sell to raise funds for the Club.
Coracle Regatta
Another opportunity to use our stalls, collect money for car parking duties, sell tents and chairs and flog used tools recovered from Steptoe’s scrap collecting. Great to see our DG in attendance here.
Xmas Trees
September was a quiet month but October saw us engaged in preparations for some new fundraising schemes. We decided to manufacture and sell 100 Xmas Trees using recycled pallets and decorated with battery powered flashing lights.
Production was centred at The Rock and again we were very fortunate to be blessed with generally warm and dry weather. At one point we had nine individuals cutting, sawing, nailing, screwing, sanding and painting all at one time. It was good fun, great comradery, and I recommend it should we decide to repeat the exercise later this year.
Perhaps trying to sell Christmas Trees at Halloween was a bit optimistic, but it proved to be a valuable learning curve. Using Facebook as a ‘free’ advertising medium was also successful and all 100 trees were sold before the end of November.
Teddy Bears
With the help of a Ladies group, ‘The Crafty Sew and Sews’ we were able to dress 20 Teddy Bears in nifty Santa Suits and effectively raffle them using the numbered card system. This proved to be a great success and boosted our Christmas Fundraising coffers greatly.
Wooden Father Christmas’s
Again, with some help from ‘The Crafty Sew and Sews’, we were able to manufacture and decorate some 100 little Wooden Santa’s that proved to be popular and desirable. These, too, were sold for good profit.
Madeley and Ironbridge Christmas Lights
The selling of Christmas Trees via the Madeley stall was a bit disappointing but, as already stated, we were able to complete sales via Facebook.
Utilising our sleigh, we were able to provide the children in our locality with a brief experience of Father Christmas whilst also manning stalls and collecting from the ever-generous people of Madeley and Ironbridge.
Other Christmas Activities
Santa also made three appearances at Asda TTC and two at Morrisons, Lawley and he proved to be highly popular wherever he went (surprise, surprise). Collections at Madeley Tesco, Sainsburys and Morrisons proved to be highly lucrative and the support of our local communities is to be applauded, their generosity is outstanding.
Anstice Concert
Though June had decided to go ‘At Large’ she fully committed herself to organising a concert ‘At The Anstice, For The Anstice ’and she is to be commended for working unceasingly to make it a success. Many difficulties arose along the way but each was overcome and an excellent night’s entertainment was enjoyed by a full hall with all proceeds going to The Anstice.
June is a natural and enthusiastic fundraiser and we hope she returns to full, active membership in the near future.
Donations / Grants/ Gift Aid
It would be remiss to overlook the success we have enjoyed in winning Grants and Donations from various bodies and also the boost to our funds from Gift Aid.
These things don’t just happen, they are the result of much time and effort spent, particularly by John Marsh and Colin, who have raised many thousands of pounds by investigating possibilities and beavering away on computer keyboards for endless hours.
The Future
Though we have achieved so much in recent times we have done so with limited and stretched resources and, although it is an old chestnut, we MUST increase our Club membership if we are to maintain the present level of service to our communities.
Jim Philbin
Fundraising Chairman
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