Welly Week 2008 – a 'bootiful' success!
Posted Tuesday 15th April 2008Welly Week 2008 may have drawn to a close but here at Garden Organic we are still reeling from the support we’ve been given by members and the general public to help us spread the organic growing message.
We're already getting our thinking ‘boots' on to make the week even bigger and better for next year but for this year we would like to thank all those people that we know got involved - it is thanks to you that more people are aware of Garden Organic and the work we do towards getting as many people as we can to grow organically.
Special thanks must go to Hunter, Airkix, Ed'S Garden Maintenance, Northern College, thedateoutdoors.com, Countrywide and Elysia, and to all those of you that took part without us knowing! If you have any pictures then do send them to us at pr@gardenorganic.org.uk.
UPDATE
The Ed's Garden Maintenance team
Ed'S Garden Maintenance
The team from Ed'S Garden Maintenance, providers of reliable and efficient garden services, pulled on their wellies and ran 10k, raising £225 towards our campaign.
Edward Mauleverer, of Thames Ditton, and four of his colleagues joined hundreds of runners and walkers at Shalford Park, Guildford, to take part in the 10K trek on the morning of Sunday 20 April 2008.
Edward Mauleverer, founder of Ed'S Garden Maintenance says, “Working in wellington boots is one thing, but running in them is certainly another! At Ed'S, we are often required to provide our customers with the work needed to set the foundations for organic growing, whether we're turning top soil on allotments or advising on compost facilities. So we're delighted to be supporting the really important contribution Garden Organic makes to encouraging a sustainable future.”
Welly Day at Elysia
Elysia
Elysia, the sole UK importer of the organic Dr.Hauschka skin care range, fully embraced taking part in Welly Week. Elysia's Chief Executive, Sebastian Parsons, explains the company's involvement, “We all wore our wellies to work for the day on Friday: me to my meetings, our trainers wore them when teaching beauty therapists how to give the Dr.Hauschka treatments and the warehouse team were running around packing customer orders in their wellies! Elysia is very supportive of the work of the charity Garden Organic, which is at the forefront of organic growing, helping to promote organic gardening, farming and food,”
Planting seeds
Northern College
Emma Methven and Kylie Haslam, final year Occupational Therapy students on placement at Northern College, Barnsley organised a family activity day as part of Welly Week 2008. The activities included face painting, seed planting, a welly wanging competition, treasure hunt, children's craft activities, as well as organic vegetable tasting and smoothie making. The event raised £50 for Garden Organic and increased awareness about organic growing and healthy eating options.
Flying Wellies!
Hunter wellies
Earlier Welly Week news
Welly Week fundraising is already hotting-up with Garden Organic's campaign receiving confirmed support from Airkix in Milton Keynes. Possibly the strangest confirmed place to wear wellies so far, Airkix, is an upwards facing wind machine that gives the feeling of free-falling from an aeroplane. Airkix are donating £3 to Garden Organic each time someone wears their wellies whilst flying from April 21-27 – so get down there, get flying and don't forget your wellies! See www.airkix.com for more details.
Other confirmed Welly Week supporters are www.thedateoutdoors.com, Ed's Garden Maintenance (who will run their local fun run whilst welly wearing) and the Hunter boots themselves who plan to attend work wearing their wellies in support of the cause, and who have kindly donated Hunter boots to Garden Organic's very own Chief Exec so that he can wear wellies to all of his meetings that week!
Running from Monday 21 to Sunday 27 April 2008, Welly Week invites school children, businesses, and members of the public, to don their favourite pair of wellies to raise money for the charity. Fundraising ideas for the week are unlimited, ranging from paying a £1 to wear wellies to work or school, or being sponsored to wear your wellies in an unusual place. Sponsored welly walks and even 'welly wanging' competions are just some of the fun ideas people had last year!
Celebrating it's 50th anniversary in 2008, Garden Organic is raising funds to help maintain its world class organic demonstration gardens, to support the vital work of its Heritage Seed Library, which preserves over 800 varieties of vegetables under threat of extinction, widen its education programmes to help more children learn about food and organic growing, and enable growers worldwide to adopt organic methods through its international development programmes.
Many of the 4,000 plus schools who take part in Garden Organic's free education programme sponsored by Duchy Originals have already pledged their support, but all schools are invited to take part. Last year a number of businesses also asked to be involved in the day, and this year the scope will be widened to ensure that nobody misses out on the Welly Week fun!
Fundraiser at Garden Organic, Liz Fredericks, says “Welly Week is about reminding people that being outdoors is fun and rewarding and that growing organically is important for the future of our children and the planet. We want to get as many people as possible out and about in their wellies to show their support for a great cause.”
Welly Week fundraising ideas:
- Why not dedicate a day to wellies during the week of the 21 – 27 April 2008 and ask pupils or work colleagues to pay a £1 to come to work or school wearing their favourite welly boots.
- Why not hold a welly wanging competition, each entrant pays a small fee and whoever throws their welly the longest distance wins a prize.
- Ask friends to sponsor you to wear your wellies somewhere unusual – such as to an office meeting or even to take part in PE at school!
- Try filling a welly up with sweets and ask people to pay a small fee to guess how many sweets are in the boot. Whoever guesses closest wins the sweets and Garden Organic benefits from the funds raised.
- Organise a sponsored welly walk. Set yourself a target distance, get some friends to sponsor you and away you go!
All funds raised can be sent to support Garden Organic. Please post all monies by cheque or postal order to Garden Organic, Membership Department, Wolston Lane, near Coventry, CV8 3LG.
For everything you need to promote Welly Week at school, in the workplace or at your local club or pub visit the Welly Week pages. From here you can download posters and stickers to print out and pick up ideas on how to raise money to support our charitable work.
Top of pageGarden Organic is the working name of the Henry Doubleday Research Association (HDRA).
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