Daffodil Day in the Spring

Marie Curie does an amazing job helping and supporting those affected by terminal illness. Mark Chambers (Past President of the Rotary Club of Billericay Mayflower) organises support for its Daffodil Day by collecting outside Waitrose in Billericay as a personal crusade of his.

As in previous years, we were invited by Mark Chambers to support this day as a personal crusade of his which we have supported in previous years.

Daffodil Day(s) Dawn

Collection was on the 7th and 8th of March at Waitrose between 9am and 5pm. Five of our members were available and signed up to help.  Bring your club tabards was the request, although Marie Curie tabards were available for those who needed them.

Friday Fun

Roger and Brian were on duty together from 1 p.m., with Les following with Alan Murdey (Billericay Town Rotary Club) from 3 p.m.

Roger reports “On Friday 7th March Brian Wellman and myself happily took a 2 hour session outside Waitrose to support the excellent Marie Curie Charity through collections from the supermarket customers. Surprisingly for a Friday, Waitrose was not as busy as usual but that didn’t prevent what customers there were for giving most generously in particular from people over say 40 years of age. 

Perhaps the excellent and impactful Marie Curie Hats were a good advertisement for the charity and could be said to be “Shopper Stoppers” resulting in the excellent donations to such a good cause.

Saturday Sunshine

Then on the following day, Ben Clarke collected from 10.00, and Peter Greene took over at 11.00 a.m..  Everybody had signed up for one or two-hour stints.

“I arrived just before 11.00 on the Saturday in brilliant sunshine and uncharacteristically warm weather”, said Peter Greene.  “Ben was just finishing and Isabel Unite, another volunteer, had already been on duty in her tabard with trays of daffodil badges and collection tins, so I swiftly put on my tabard and loaded up with a tray of badges and a collecting tin.  Isabel and I each wore very yellow daffodil hats as well, to attract passers-by.”

Considering it was a “peak” shopping day, both Roger and Peter remarked that footfall was quite light compared to last year.  Despite this, and although there were the usual passers-by who managed to avoid catching our eyes, people were generally very generous with a majority stopping to drop coins in the collection tins, and some even giving £5 or £10 notes.  Fortunately we had a SumUp card reader with us and some people who had no cash were very willing to use them for a card donation.  (Over £300 was collected via SumUp over the two days).

On Tuesday March 11 we heard from Mark Chambers, who had organised the collections so effectively that the total Collected via all routes was £1,437.93.  Mark said “Just heard that the grand total we made was £1,437.93 (Friday made £696, Saturday (with less collecting time) £430 and £310 on the card reader.  To say I am pleased is a little bit of an understatement. Thank you all so much for your efforts."

Well done Mark!  Well done to all the volunteers.