Merry Christmas!

[caption id="attachment_7529" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Bertrams have pulled out the stops! Click on the pic to enlarge if needed[/caption]

What better way to finish Community Link-Up for 2013 with our third and final look at festive jumpers!

Bertrams have sent us a fine selection of knitwear from the day, together with the news they raised a fantastic £219.38 in the process :)

Which means the overall total raised for Save the Children now stands at £363.76.

All that remains is to wish you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year.

Community Link-Up will return on January 6th 2014.

Christmas Jumper Day... Take 2

[caption id="attachment_7472" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Another fine festive selection as modelled by James Bullen, Rachel Underhill and Sophie Morris[/caption]

Instore took the opportunity to show off their Christmas jumpers last week as part of their staff raffle and buffet festivities.

Meanwhile those too shy to go on camera at Rowan House, raised a further £69.38 for Save the Children.

Thus the total raised for Christmas Jumper Day now stands at £144.38 :)

Christmas Jumper Day... Take 1

[caption id="attachment_7464" align="aligncenter" width="640"] A fine selection of festive knitwear from Wednesbury - click on the pic to enlarge[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_7480" align="alignright" width="300"] NAC also showing a good turnout[/caption]

Congratulations to the Customer Services team at Wednesbury, you have the honour of sending the first pictures for Christmas Jumper Day 2013 :)

And what a fine turnout it was, netting contributions of £38.

NAC weren't to be outdone, with their selection raising £37.

Did your location take part in Save the Children's Christmas Jumper Day? We have space on the blog this week for your pics!

The Consortium go Dotty for Children in Need

PJs, onesies and all kinds of dotted wear, not to mention a celebrity visit from Mr Blobby, meant a fun time was had by all at both The Consortium's Trowbridge and Shrewsbury sites recently. All in the name of Children in Need :)

Bring Out Your Festive Jumpers!

Save the date! December 13th is Christmas Jumper Day!

Ron Weasley's mum was famous for her knitted Christmas jumpers in the Harry Potter books; maybe someone in your family has the same claim to fame? If so, it's time to search those cupboards and bring out your festive jumper stash!

Or perhaps you preferred Sarah Lund's stylish jumpers in The Killing and have one of your own like this one. No problem, that counts too!

It's all a bit of fun to raise some festive cash for Save the Children.

Who can take part?

NB This is a general blog post available to everyone in Smiths News,  so do check whether your location is taking part first. If it is, and you don't have any customer-facing meetings planned, then we're asking for a donation of £1 to take part.

OK, I'm in, but I don't have a Christmas jumper :(

That's no problem, you could buy, borrow or decorate one!

Sweater style knows no limits, so why not get creative and decorate your own glitzy knitwear with tinsel, stars, baubles and snowflakes?

Deramores are Save the Children's partner wool supplier* - they also have plenty of freebie knitted and crochet decoration ideas to make your jumper festive. So far there are patterns for puddings, a holly garland, robins, stockings, bears and snowflakes with more to come.

The Save the Children website also has a downloadable mini jumper pattern created by Debbie Bliss, which you could add to your clothing as your cheeky contribution to the day!

This is a fun idea suitable for lots of locations to join in. Don't forget to send us your photos!

Or make your own

A festive jumper isn't just for Christmas Jumper Day! If you're looking for a longer term project and like the look of the snowman sweater featured at the top of this post, then you'll also find a link to the downloadable pattern on the Save the Children Christmas Jumper Day website.

The Deramores website has a selection of other festive designs for an alternative to the snowman jumper e.g. snowflakes.

* = Throughout November Deramores are also donating 50p to Save the Children where any order includes one ball of sirdar wool.

All the Fun of Children in Need

OK, so we've had the build-up to last week's Children in Need, so how did everyone get on?

First up is Rowan House...

[caption id="attachment_7333" align="alignleft" width="300"] l-r: Sam Marlow, Kayla Watts (donning Pudsey ears!), Laura Morris, Jennifer Taylor, Jade Cholod[/caption]

Laura Morris said:

"We had a great selection of homemade sweets, cakes, cookies and truffles on offer - we did a trolley dash around both floors of the office so people didn't even need to get out of their seats :)"

Just like their trolley, the total raised is a bit of a moveable feast. The latest update we have is £168.62!

Next, we have the first of two reports hailing from Borehamwood: NNSC to be precise for the first...



...they had a pyjama day which was one of this year's fun activities suggested for all Children in Need participants.

I see we have an "elephant in the room" to rival the Tigger onesie Richard Osman was wearing on Friday's edition of Pointless!

The total raised was a nifty £80.

... and last but not least Kelly Carey from Smiths News Borehamwood completes our round-up...



... "our staff made Poppadums, Samosas, Onion Bhajis, Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Brownies and lots of other delightful things. We charged £2 a plate and raised £80.

We also took part in playing “Guess what song Pudsey and Gary sang live in concert” we charged £2 a guess and £30 went to Children in Need and £30 went to the winner.

Altogether Borehamwood Group raised a total of £121."

That makes a grand total of £369.62 - great stuff!

Ahoy Children in Need!

[caption id="attachment_7308" align="alignright" width="300"] Pudsey says 'Hurrah!' :)[/caption]

We have news of another virtual Link-Up!

Following last week's Children in Need preview, Newport, Rowan House and The Consortium have all been in touch with news on how they're taking part this year.

Newport's Judy Read says:

"It will be cakes / bacon rolls on Thursday and we are going to be wearing hats for the day – the sillier the better.  We will be charging 50p to wear a hat but fining people £2.00 if they don’t join in!"

...and this from The Consortium's Joanne Kent:

"We are having a Children in Need day with people invited to come in wearing spotty clothes and bringing teddies in."

... and I hear there's a sweetie stall at Rowan House with home-made honeycomb. Save some for me!

We're standing by to take on board all the pictorial evidence and news on the amount raised. If your location is also taking part, grab that camera phone now and add your news and pics! Pudsey gets an extra £20 if you do so :)

Cake and Drag News!

On Saturday Rowan House's Jennifer Taylor and friends turned out in great numbers and a variety of outfits for Swindon in Drag 2013! The photos show they had a lot of fun and I'm sure the warm weather helped to make it a great evening out on the town.

And Jennifer's efforts to reach her £1,000 target for Cancer Research UK continue! She's bringing in cakes today and all donations in exchange for a cake are welcome :)

Swindon in Drag 2013

[caption id="attachment_6037" align="aligncenter" width="640"] A look back at 2012 - I wonder how things went on Saturday...[/caption]

By the time you read this, plenty of participants from Rowan House will have taken part in Saturday's Swindon in Drag event for 2013.

Just like last year, Jennifer Taylor is the organiser and sent us the above picture from last year as a trailer for this year's event. Sadly there wasn't time to bring you the news ahead of Saturday, but I'm sure Jennifer won't mind if I use her words to describe what was in store...

The time of year has come around again where me and my friends make fools of ourselves, dress up in clothing of the opposite gender, and attempt to raise as much money as possible for Cancer Research UK :)

We’ve had some brilliant years previously but we’ve never managed to break the £1000 mark and we’re super determined to get there this year!! Any donation you can make via our Just Giving page will be hugely appreciated by myself and my friends. 

I also found out recently that someone from my past that had a huge influence on me as a teenager has recently died of cancer, so I’ll be dedicating my efforts to Stuart Holland, the man who gave me my first job at WHSmiths in Marlborough when I was 16! He even left me in charge of the store on Sundays when I was 17… brave man!

Thanks for your support!

I hope it went well Jennifer and you all had a fun evening raising pots of cash! 

We Haz Plans...

We have news of a couple of plans for this year's Charity Fundraising.



Firstly, we have a sneak preview of the provisional plan The Consortium has mapped out for their fundraising activities in Trowbridge this year :)

This year they're raising funds to support the West Wiltshire Special Needs Activity Scheme and have a number of events planned for the whole of 2013.

Completed

• January – The Consortium presented a cheque for £12,132.77 to Wiltshire Air Ambulance, their chosen good cause for 2012


• February – TV Raffle (and many other prizes!) raised a massive £460


• 15^th March – Comic Relief – raised £237

The raffle and Comic Relief fundraising were both held as 'cross-site' events, involving The Consortium's Trowbridge and Shrewsbury sites.

To Come

• April – Grand national sweepstake


• 21^st April – Kim Valentine runs the London Marathon (again!)


• 14^th May – Quiz Night held at the Wesley Road Club in Trowbridge


• September – The Consortium Annual Golf Day


• 28^th September - Macmillan Coffee Morning and the annual Golden Spoon competition


• September / October – Race Night


• 25^th October – Wear it Pink day


• December – Christmas Raffle

There's plenty going on at The Consortium in 2013! We look forward to seeing more news and pictures as each event happens :)

Secondly Terri Baylis at Rowan House has given us news of her revised plans for her walk set for June in aid of CLIC. She originally was going to tackle 25 miles of the scenic Jurassic Coast and now...

I’ve updated my JustGiving page - we’re now walking the Ridgeway between Avebury & Streatley on 14-15^th July, which is around 40 miles over the two days.

Thanks for the update Terri - I see you've added quite a few miles to your proposed walk!

Do you or your area have a fundraising plan this year? Do let us know what you have in store... and don't forget it may also provide an opportunity for a wider Link-Up with your colleagues, suppliers or customers in some way!

Red Nose Day Round-up

Last Friday saw an outbreak of red noses - and cakes! - as many locations got down to the serious business of funraising for Comic Relief. Here's a quick tour of the day's highlights...

Borehamwood...

...entered into a Bake Off with strong entries from across the group. Group Manager Jim Sinden was nominated as chief taster which he struggled to say no to!

Jim enjoyed the full experience of tasting all entries and awarded first prize to Becky in CS for a lovely moist carrot cake that was to his liking.

Well done to everyone who took part in the day, raising £160.

And then over at...

...Bertrams

A Mary Berry style bake-off raised £271.57 in total.

£41.16 of that came from the sales team following their Onesie/PJ’s and casual wear antics.  The photo is of Carole Fletcher (Account Executive) and Faye Barnes (Account Manager). Faye is on the left, Carole on the right.

The Consortium made sure their presence at the Education Show didn't stop them joining in on the fun! They simply brought forward their Red Nose Day to the Wednesday and held a 'cross-site' event, meaning both Trowbridge and Shrewsbury got involved.

[gallery type="rectangular" link="post" ids="5268,5269,5270,5271"]

As Comic Relief celebrates its 25 year anniversary this year, they chose 'everything 80’s' as their theme for a dress up day. Prizes were awarded for best fancy dress in all locations – for field sales, a prize was on offer for the most subtle costume!

Lots of comic cakes were also baked to celebrate. As you can see they submitted a few pictures of everyone dressed up, but the cakes were snapped up too quickly for photos! A total of  £237 was raised across the two sites.

[gallery type="rectangular" link="post" ids="5274,5275"]

And finally, Rowan House have submitted evidence of cakes disguised as red noses! This was the first cake sale since moving office in Swindon last October, so it was long overdue.

Staff baked lots of cakes and other sweet goodies, which sold extremely well throughout the day. And following demand for some savoury goodies, our resident ‘Great British Baker’ Nic Hewlett (Finance) baked one of her legendary pies - this one was chicken, sausage meat and stuffing. There wasn’t much time to admire it though - as people were queuing up to devour it!

Their funraising netted £136.85, thus making a grand total of £805.42 for this report :)

Darren Finds His Ho Ho Ho

Darren Turner (Operations Director at Bertrams) had a key part to play recently when he (shhhh! don't tell anyone) dressed up as Santa for Friends of Stoke Ash primary school's fundraiser, near Eye.

The Friends raise funds for equipment for the school, plus support children from under privileged backgrounds who cannot afford items such as being able to go on school trips e.g. the Friends are paying for some children to go to Aladdin in Norwich.

Says Darren:

We raised £480 at the school Christmas fair, I raised over £80 as Santa. Sorry the picture is not brilliant but it was dark in the Grotto.

Thanks for helping Dispatches get in a festive mood Darren :)

Newport Supports Children in Need

Newport ensured this year's Children in Need was supported in style last Thursday and Friday, raising £180 in the process. Judy Read reports...

[caption id="attachment_4410" align="alignleft" width="640"] Mmm... Pudsey Cupcakes :)[/caption]

Clare Hockey made some rather scrummy Pudsey cupcakes and sales went rather well. Here's Sarah Collins selling cakes to Maria in the warehouse.



However, if you prefer savoury to sweet, bacon rolls always go down a storm. Gary Cain puts the final touches to his roll. NB I prefer brown sauce too!

As well as selling cakes and bacon rolls to their Newport colleagues, some of the staff in Customer Services went the 'extra mile' and donned their PJs for the day...

[caption id="attachment_4411" align="alignleft" width="640"] All in their PJs for the day - Michelle Yalland, Sarah Melchior, Judy Read, Claire Hockey and Andrew Herbert at the front[/caption]

Putting the Fun Into Fundraising

[caption id="attachment_3584" align="alignleft" width="300"] The tombola in full flow. From left to right are Chloe Webb, Aileen Newsome, Vicky Rhodes & Kate Jewson[/caption]

We're still catching up with all your fantastic news from Community Week! First up for this week's blog posts is the following report from Chloe Webb and Vicky Rhodes...

[caption id="attachment_3585" align="alignleft" width="300"] Mike Ward with his tombola loot[/caption]

The NAC used Community Week as an opportunity for some Fun-Raising.  Having already held our main events in April and May, our thoughts turned to sweets, cakes and ice cream, all of which helped us reach and beat our original fund-raising target of £1600 by £400.  The now infamous NAC Baking Sale was arranged by Chloe Webb and Vicky Rhodes and this raised a fantastic £103 in one day with BLS and Aldermore Finance who also occupy the building joining in.

Chloe and Vicky also arranged a Tombola which was great fun and again raised £120 in less than an hour!

Many of the staff paid to dress down for a whole week and we rounded off the fun with an ice cream parlour treat for everyone on Friday afternoon.

[caption id="attachment_3586" align="alignleft" width="300"] Kathryn Johnson, Kristy Carr and Vicky Holdsworth finishing their well-deserved ice creams[/caption]

You may remember the Smarties Challenge that we started in March which involved filling an empty Smarties tube (having eaten the Smarties first of course) with spare 20p coins.  Around 50 people took part and we raised £550 in total, smashing our £500 target.  A great result.

Fun-tastic everyone! The money raised goes to NAC's nominated local charities: Cancer Support Bradford and Airedale, and SACAR.

Swindon In Drag

Data Management's Jennifer Taylor at Wakefield House was involved with organising a Community Week event with a difference last weekend, when around 30 people took to the streets and pubs of Swindon town centre in drag! This is the fourth year the event has taken place and was in aid of Cancer Research UK.

Around £700 has been raised so far, though the target is £1,000.

As you can see from the picture set below, everyone looks to have had a really good time in the name of a good cause!

[caption id="attachment_3572" align="aligncenter" width="640"] A few pictures showing everyone enjoying themselves![/caption]

It's Rainbow Friday!

Helen Ives and her HR colleagues at Bertrams have come up with a fresh twist on the Dress Down Friday theme (or up for that matter) to raise funds for Sense.

Since the end of May, they've been holding Rainbow Fridays. Participants pay a £1 to dress in the nominated colour for that week. Each one is different and it all comes to a colourful end in Community Week, with orange designated as the final colour.

I wonder if this was chosen in view of Dispatches' main header colour? Today's colour is Green, and Purple will be  on view next Friday.

[caption id="attachment_3162" align="alignright" width="300"] Jubilee colours[/caption]

A patriotic red, white and blue were chosen for the Friday before the Jubilee weekend, with staff showing a number of ways in which they complied with the new 'dress code'.

Sadly Dispatches wasn't offered photographic evidence of the boys dressed up in pink ;)

Having a Bit of Trouble

[caption id="attachment_3117" align="alignleft" width="168"] Watch out![/caption]

Having a bit of trouble in the Office today Dennis has come to work...

... was the cry for help issued at Stoke House recently to Paul Tucknutt. Paul then decided to let his colleagues at Aberystwyth, Shrewsbury, Stoke and Wednesbury in on the 'problem':

Dianne Nancarrow in Stoke House has really got in the spirit of Wednesbury Group Community Week Fancy Dress-Dress Down day. Well Done to Dianne or is it Dennis for getting in the spirit of what Community Week fund raising  is all about.

We thought everyone reading Dispatches might also like to see what was going on ;)

I wonder where Gnasher is...

Slough Puts on the Fancy Dress

[caption id="attachment_2949" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Slough Group Managers[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_2950" align="alignleft" width="225"] Jim Sinden and Simon Lockett aka "The Men in Black"[/caption]

The managers at Slough House found a fun way to raise funds recently by raiding their dressing up boxes to find all kinds of fancy dress to make coming to work just that little bit different.

The results included assorted medics, a cowboy plus a cowgirl, an arab, a pirate, a soldier, even a nun! The Men in Black were also on hand to investigate should the odd alien appear in the office to wreak havoc and mayhem.

An impressive £879 was raised for Cancer Research along the way.

NSP Try Out 'Granny Chic'

[caption id="attachment_2750" align="alignleft" width="640" caption="The NSP team show off their finery"][/caption]

Friday 20^th April saw the Wakefield House NSP team ‘Ageing for Athelstan’, as they donned attire stereotypically associated with the ‘older generation’ in a bid to raise funds for Athelstan House Care Home for the elderly.

As well as their own interpretation of Granny Chic, there was also a whole host of activities that took place throughout the day, including…

• Bric- a-Brac Sale


• Ration Token lunch: People were told to leave their lunchboxes as home and purchase a ration tokens for £1.50. This entitled them to a lovely plateful of food offered by the NSP Team.


• There was also a chance to guess the combined age of the NSP team at £1 a go (The money raised was split between the winner and charity), as well as ‘Guessing the famous old people’ (not sure how they’ll define ‘old’), and ‘Name the Granny and Grandad’.

A grand[ad] total of £164.87 was raised - chictastic!

Reading Are Multitasking

Reading House have news of two fundraising activities so far this year, held in January and also earlier this month.

Graham Adlington (Facilities Manager), Sam Canido (Day Pack Manager) and Amy Davidson (Deputy Customer service Manager) have got together to organise Dress Down/Car Wash/Cake Sale days in aid of Cancer Research and Stroke Care.

They've chosen these charities because of staff  and relations who have/had cancer and also Stroke Care has given continuous support to an ex-employee (Dini Letterio).

A total of of £322.50 has been raised so far to be split £180.00 for Cancer Research and £142.50  for Stroke Care.