KitAid Monthly Update March 2023

I would like to welcome Shelagh from Sheffield and George from Basingstoke who have recently joined the team as Regional Volunteers for their areas.  Welcome to Team KitAid.

March has been another busy month and here are the key highlights.

Totals

12,635 items sent out in March

37,135 items sent out in 2023

971,032 items sent out since 1998

28,968 items to go until we reach 1,000,000 items donated!! I predict we will reach the magic milestone at some point in June.

25th Anniversary Celebration

Friday 8th September, Watford FC -Ticket price £30

As expected for the hottest tickets in town, within just a couple of weeks of going on sale, we have almost reached our maximum sales figure of 100 tickets.  There are still some available so please reply quickly if you wish to attend. Thanks to everyone who has already paid and next month we will send out further details and gather dietary requirements etc.

The evening is taking shape with a special band booked and some entertaining speakers, a nostalgic look back at the previous 25 year highlights and a lovely KitAid evening for all.

Auction prizes

We have started to gather some great auction items but need help in finding some more. Especially event/experience type prizes such as match day tickets or attendance at a special event. If you know of anyone who can help with this please contact them and share our wonderful 25 year successes.

25 for 25 Challenge

Many congratulations to Barrie N, our Regional Volunteer for Chelmsford, who has reached his fundraising target of £250 already. Barrie set himself a challenge of visiting 25 football grounds across Essex and although he has not yet finished, he has made some great contacts from Clubs he has met. He told the Secretary of Runwell Sports FC about his challenge and they very generously donated £200 and also agreed to put a KitAid banner on display.

Well done Barrie and good luck to Ben W who will be starting his swimming challenge in April. If you haven’t yet signed up for a challenge and would like details please let me know.

Liverpool FC Foundation

We would like to offer our thanks to the LFC Foundation team for their very generous support last Saturday at their Legends fundraising game.

We have a long standing relationship with the Foundation and they have donated a lot of kit over many years. In recognition of our 25th Anniversary year they very kindly presented a special “KitAid 25” shirt pitchside at half time. It was somewhat overwhelming walking out of the tunnel, under the famous LFC logo, in front of 50,000 supporters, but an incredible experience.

Thanks to Trustee Janet N, for arranging everything with the team at LFC Foundation.

KitAid Supporters Cup

You may remember that we were unable to present the Cup last November as the match between Leverstock Green and Aylesbury Vale Dynamoes ended in a 2-2 draw following a 93rd minute equaliser!  Our friends at LG went on to win the away leg 4-2, but we were unable to attend on the night.

The plan is to present the Cup at their home game tomorrow (1st April), but I have a feeling this may be scuppered by the constant rain today and over the last few days. We have already had to get the engraving changed from 2022 to 2023 so fingers crossed they get their hands on the Cup this week, month, year!!

Boots

Football boots are highly sought after at all of the projects we support and as much as possible, we share those that we receive to the different projects.  We have recently started to work more closely with the charity, Charity Boots, from North London, and they were offered a substantial donation of 2,000 pairs of brand new boots.  We have taken delivery and are helping them with temporary storage and they have donated 1,000 pairs to KitAid.

We have already passed on half of the total to partners such as FOMO Malawi and the rest will go quickly. This is a great example of small charities working together and we have always supported sharing of opportunities, contacts and knowledge as much as possible.

Social Media

I am sure you are aware that we post almost every day on Twitter, Instagram and FB and we have nearly 4,000 followers on Twitter.  However, with the imminent changes by Mr M, Twitter will become much less user friendly and not as easy to see our posts. We are certainly not going to pay for a blue tick!!

Can I suggest that you start to follow KitAidCharity on Instagram so you do not miss out on the wonderful photos and film clips we receive from the projects we support.

Well I think these are the main highlights for March and please, if you do wish to attend the 25th Anniversary Celebration on 8th September, let me know by return.

Many thanks for your help and support.

Derrick