SEASHELL TRUST looked to leading Manchester events company Make Events on Saturday to provide innovative fundraising in the current climate. With so many events being cancelled this year, meaning a drop in vital funds for the charity, the team at Seashell Trust have had to get creative with their fundraising and Make Events was the first port of call.
They lived up to their name by hosting a celeb-packed Strictly themed fundraising quiz over Zoom, pulled together in under a week. Make Events founder Holly Moore brainstormed the idea to raise funds for Seashell Trust – a charity which supports children and young adults with profound disabilities and additional communication needs.
The Strictly Lockdown quiz – hosted by TV presenter Gethin Jones – replaced the Trust’s Annual Ball, ‘Strictly Seashell’, which had to be cancelled following the Covid-19 outbreak.
Events supremo Holly managed to call on a host of famous faces, using her famous little black book of celebrities’ numbers to ensure the evening was strictly a success, raising more than £10,000 for the trust.
Famous names taking part were TV’s Vernon Kay, funnyman Justin Moorhouse, actor Kelvin Fletcher and guest appearances from TV stars Michelle Keegan, Gemma Atkinson and Samia Longchambon.
Also making a guest appearance was Strictly star Denise van Outen who encouraged viewers to dance along to a DJ set.
Senior Manager Rachel McCrystal from Seashell Trust said “We can’t thank Gethin and Holly Moore and her team enough for pulling together to deliver a fantastic virtual event to raise valuable funds for Seashell Trust, but also to bring our community of supporters together on what would have been our major fundraising event of the year.”
After the event, Gethin said: “Firstly I was blown away by how much we were able to raise for Seashell Trust by playing a quiz.
It says a lot about the generosity of people during these tough times. Through Make Events’ efforts it was also an insight into how company events might be run in the immediate future.”
Holly from Make Events, whose team has worked on the event for the last two years, added: “We were devastated when we had to cancel the event after the success of last year and after the team had worked so hard to make this year’s just as good.
In all my years in the industry I have never cancelled an event so I held a virtual meeting with the team and the Strictly Lockdown quiz was the result.
I was so happy when the Trust agreed we should go ahead with it and I cannot thank enough everyone who took part and donated.”
Strictly Seashell has been rescheduled to 20 March 2021.
