Welcome to PubAid

Contact Your MP

We believe that pubs play a vital role in the fabric of the community, yet all too often they are vilified by the press. If you’d like to share the message about how important the pub is to you and your community and share the fact that pubs raise over £100m for charity each year, then here’s a resource designed to help you contact your local MP:

Write to your MP

Case Studies: Create your own Tour de ?????

The UK’s best Fundraising Pub announces latest success

Pub: Royal Oak, West Sussex

Event: Cycling
Charity: St Catherine's Hospice
Money Raised: Over £2,000
Effort & Cost to Organise: Low

The Royal Oak in Friday Street, near Rusper, West Sussex, was crowned Fundraiser of the Year at the British Institute of Innkeeping (BII) Annual Awards in May 2014, but they clearly aren’t resting on their laurels after announcing that they raised just over £2,000 in theor latest mad-cap plan to raise money for Charity: The ‘Tour de Rusper’.

The Tour de Rusper was a fancy dress bike ride from the Royal Oak and back to the Royal Oak, via a round trip of about 4.5 miles leaving the pub at midday, stopping at Rusper shop to pick up a St Catherine's Hospice sticker and to get fancy dress judged, then back to the pub for a BBQ!

A few words from the organiser:

“We have a long-standing relationship with the team at St Catherine’s Hospice and are delighted to help support the great work they do. We were pleased with how many people took part and funds raised.”

This was easy to arrange, most people have a bike. We just had to come up with the name – I believe there’s a similar race in France each year. We then used social media to promote it and popped a few posters. We also benefitted from some great local PR: www.thedistrictpost.co.uk/news/2014/09/uks-best-fundraising-pub-announces-further-success

Sara Blunden, owner of the Royal Oak

Royal Oak 
Friday Street
Rusper
W Sussex
RH12 4QA

Tel: 01293 871393
www.theroyaloakrusper.co.uk

Fundraising Case Study: Blockheads at The Brewery

The Partridge Pub in Partridge Green took their standard music night to anew level, taking over the local brewery with a big gig to raise money for The Dark Star Foundation

Pub: The Partridge, Partridge Green

Event: Gig
Charity: Dark Star Foundation
Money Raised: Over £5,000
Effort & Cost to Organise: High

The pub is the Brewery Tap for the Sussex brewer and is well-known for the occasional music night, but this took the whole thing to a new level. They invited The Blockheads to play a gig at the Brewery, just around the corner from the pub. The event sold out in a matter of weeks (350 at £20 a ticket).

There was a lot of work preparing the brewery and putting a stage in and associated cost. The band also charged a feem though a redueced one. After expenses, the event, including ticket sales and food / bar take, raised £5000 for the Dark Star Foundation. www.darkstarbrewing.co.uk/foundation.

A few words from the organiser:

“This wasn’t an easy gig to organise and the related costs were pretty high. Thanksfully the entire brewing team gave their time for free to help. The positive impact of the event went way beyond th money raised, people really engaged with the pub and the brewery.”

We benefitted from some great local PR: : www.theargus.co.uk/news/13588834.Blockheads_team_up_with_Dark_Star_for_special_beer

Stephanie Chitty

Royal Oak 
Friday Street
Rusper
W Sussex
RH12 4QA

Tel: 01293 871393
www.theroyaloakrusper.co.uk

To help inspire your fundraising, here are the finalists from last year’s BII Fundraiser of the Year Awards

Pub: Royal Oak, West Sussex

A small pub with a strong sense of community. The current owners moved into the pub seven years ago and have raised in excess of £26k for a local hospice, plus a further £8k for the air ambulance service in conjunction with another pub in Devon.

Fundraising event include:

• Snail and chicken races
• Pantomime Dame & Pantomime Horse racing, we have raced
• Annual Rusper Regatta with ‘boat’ racing (up the road!)
• Annual Weed Show
• R.O.A.D.S (Royal Oak amateur dramatic society) performances’ in the pub garden
• Festive plays at Christmas time
• Pantomime Horse Chariot Race, where regulars made and sponsored the chariots which were pulled by two pantomime horses each. The day also included sheep racing, Weed show and Barn Dance, with cricket and croquet. The weekend alone raised £3k.
• No mobile phone policy in the pub, each time a phone rings £1 has to be put in the charity pot

Pub: The Sweet Olive at The Chequers, Oxfordshire

The pub is at the centre of our two communities, and during the past 10 years the owners have supported many charities including local organisations, schools, playgroups, cricket clubs, gardening clubs and Bonfire Night associations. Charity efforts include:

Fundraising event include:

• The team founded the village’s ASTONAHLON in 2010, a charity 10km run and 30 km cycle where each applicant raises a minimum of £50. The event has raised over £30k over the last three years for a children’s hospital, a cancer research charity and donated funds to a local children’s playground.
• Boules annual competition raiseing over £10k. Has a French theme with pub meal and prizes.
• ‘Olivier and The Henley Challenge’ Triathlon, which saw a local take on the challenge raising over £20k.
• Steak and Capon nights raising over £5k

Pub: The Swan, Bristol

The pub is a big part of the community, raised approximately £23k for charity last year, all of which are local organisationsl, including supporting a young gentleman who was struggling with carrying on running a family home after his wife passed away, through to local charities and community projects.

Regular events include:

• Weekly skittles tournament and card-making for people with learning difficulties
• Charity quiz every week , Thursday night we have charity
• Bingo
• Live music nights at weekends
• BBQ on the patio
• Hosts community events such as craft fairs, Christmas Lights, Royal British Legion meeting ‘lodge’ in the function room

Helpful Tips for Fundraising

Some Fundraising advice from 2014 Fundraiser of the Year, Sara Blunden from the Royal Oak, Rusper, West Sussex

A pub is nothing without it’s regulars, I say regulars not locals as many of them travel some distance to join us. You have to have a sense of community about your pub, an atmosphere where people look after each other, I think that if you genuinely care that rubs off. A pub has to be much more than a business venture but once you have that community spirit the rest falls easily into place. It does help, if like me, you can surround yourself with a lot of fun loving fools with big hearts!

Get creative. It is thinking of something different – we have had boat races without water, snail racing which is far more exciting than you might imagine, pantomime horse and pantomime dame racing, sheep and chicken racing and much more. We are about to host the ‘Tour de Rusper’ a fancy dress bike ride!

Most ideas come from jolly banter at the bar aided by a glass of beer! You only need the odd casual comment to plant the seed of an idea. Once the idea is coming together you need to try to plan it to get the most enjoyment for the most amount of people. The ‘Fun’ in fundraising is the key, people look at it as a great day out and the fact that we raise money for charity is almost a by product!

Most pubs will have a few key players who are happy to get on with tasks you may give them or just good at mobilising other people – ask them, they are good at it because they enjoy doing it. I know we could not have done so much without my handful of key players.

The easiest charities to support are local ones, we mainly support the local hospice, everyone knows about them and the great work they do, many of my locals will have had personal experience with family or friends they may have lost. Sometimes one of the locals may have benefited from a different charity so we may hold a little event for that but we mostly stick to the same one.

A few more thoughts…

Whatever your event, always put a raffle on – people love a raffle and you’ll be surprised how quickly you rack up a few extra quid.

Marketing – having a great idea for an event is useless if no one turns up. Make sure you email your local press a few weeks ahead of the event and get some posters out there (maybe ask for help creating these from a talented regular). If you’re into twitter and facebook, make sure you promote your event and invite friends and have friends invite their friends…soon becomes a big number.

Stay Legal. Think about the logistics – will you have larger numbers than usual coming to your pub, probably! So, what’s you plan for parking, crowd control and have you applied for a TEN? For more on TENs, see: www.popall.co.uk/licensingapplications/temporary.asp

Remember, this will be a lot of work, but as well as raising lots of money for great causes, this is an opportunity to impress lots of potential new customers as they may well be coming to your pub for the first time.

Share your event with the team at PubAid via twitter @PubAid or find them on:

facebook.com/pubaidcharity or e-mail james@instinctivepr.co.uk