Here at 4Site, we are very proud of our involvement with the Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund. Given the outstanding work they do in the community to help some of the most vulnerable children and their families to enjoy precious times together, we wanted to announce our most recent donation to them. As you may already remember, we successfully supported the charity in September when their popular ‘Star for a Star’ campaign was running.
When the fund contacted us once more at the back end of 2022, we decided that helping out with the charity’s latest venture was something we wanted to be a part of. Their Christmas fundraising programme last year ran under the slogan of ‘The Gift of Time‘. Given that the campaign’s organiser, Lindsey Bidwell, was especially interested in getting Essex-based businesses on board, as a company located in Basildon, we thought it was the least we could do to get involved.
The Gift of Time differed from their previous fundraising campaign quite considerably. Because it was organised in the run-up to the festive period, the charity organised it so that each day in December up to Christmas Day itself would be represented not just by a commercial sponsor based in the county but by a cancer sufferer’s family, as well.
What this meant is that every donation that was made to the campaign would be allocated to a specific child in need of respite care with their families. We are delighted to say that the Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund achieved their ambition of receiving 25 commercial donations from sponsorship partners. All these were represented on a virtual Advent calendar that it set up on its web page.
A bauble was placed on a digital Christmas tree designed to represent each of the family getaways the various sponsors would be funding. Various generous businesses in the region should be applauded for their involvement in ‘The Gift of Time’. CK Blinds, Simon’s Shoe Services, Thundersley Superhero Alliance, ICE Data Services and KJL Group were just a few examples of other companies that wanted to be a part of making the campaign a success.
At 4Site Implementation, our donation was allocated by the charity on the tenth day of the campaign, meaning that our sponsorship was represented on the calendar’s tenth bauble. More importantly, perhaps, is what that bauble meant for the family involved.
A Personal Touch
We are so pleased to say that in support of the charitable campaign, our sponsorship went very specifically to the family of a young cancer patient named Flora. Thanks to the way the Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund operates, they were able to offer Flora – and her nearest and dearest – the gift of a short break away from the trials and tribulations of her ongoing treatment. Given that there are very many ways that businesses, like ours, can choose to give money to good causes, what could be better than making a sponsorship offer that will make a true difference to a young individual and her family?
For their part, Flora’s family said that they were grateful for being given the opportunity to have a holiday at Lennox Lodge. “It was amazing to have a break in such a nice lodge and to visit some new places we have never visited before,” one of Flora’s family members said. According to the family, the short holiday our donation paid for was perfect for the whole group.
This is because the older children in the family were able to make use of the facilities on site while Flora, who is quite a bit younger than her siblings, could take a nap when she needed to or was able to enjoy some quieter times. “We really appreciated spending some fun time together,” the family told us.
The charity thanked us, as well. It acknowledged that the respite care holiday offered by them to Flora’s family was only possible thanks to our support. In a statement, the campaign’s chief fundraiser said that our generous gift meant that Flora and her family would be able to enjoy a precious getaway in the coming year. “They will be able to spend some time together away from the harsh realities of childhood cancer as a family,” her statement went on. We could not be happier for Flora and her family.
This turned out to be especially poignant given the family’s experience after their last respite break. Shortly after they had all returned home from their sponsored trip away together as a family unit, Flora went on to contract an infection. Unfortunately, this led to a spell in hospital for a few nights. According to Flora’s family, this sort of thing means that a respite break away from home can be even more valuable to them. “We feel so lucky,” they said at the time, “that we were able to make it through the holiday without any drama.”
The Gift of Time
For many Essex-based businesses, we know that the trading conditions they’ve been working through in the last year haven’t always been the most conducive. Like other designers and producers of high-quality products, whether they’re for the visual marketing sector or not, we’ve seen rising costs and some short-term supply issues. That said, we work extremely hard at focussing on what our customers want and make plans to meet or even exceed them.
That’s why 2022 was another successful year for us despite the wider challenges in the economy. Under such circumstances, making a donation to a reputable charity like the Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund, which does such good work for the likes of Flora and other families affected by life-limiting illnesses, was the right thing to do. And that’s something we can say we are truly proud of, too.
Speaking of our involvement in the Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund’s most recent Christmas campaign, it said that it was ‘very grateful’ for the generosity of everyone involved here. “We would like to thank 4Site for sponsoring a respite break in 2023 and for giving the gift of time this Christmas,” it said.
