Target reached! Stretch target: £25,000
The last 3 weeks have been incredible. We have gone from seriously worrying about ...
The last 3 weeks have been incredible. We have gone from seriously worrying about ...
Aim: Your support will secure the financial survival of a friendly community club, and help us invest in future improvements.
Who We Are & What We Do
Founded in 1856, the Club serves the Hythe community and surrounding rural areas. We have cricket, squash, racketball and football teams, indoor bowls and a golf society, and partner clubs offer pilates, singing, yoga and a running club on our site. Members come from all walks of life and range in age from 6 to 87. We offer a warm welcome to anyone wanting to play sport and enjoy the social activities and support that comes with being part of a friendly club.
The Club is run by a volunteer management committee, and while we employ a fantastic bar manager and three very part-time bar staff, all sporting activities and social events are run and organised by volunteers, and much of the Club maintenance is completed by volunteers.
We've maintained Clubmark Status (Sport England's national accreditation scheme for high quality community sports clubs) for the past 15 years.
Why We Need Your Support
Our club policy is to keep fees low to enable everyone to play sport without financial barriers, so in 'normal' times most of our income comes from community boot fairs and summer functions and events. This year we lost close to £30,000 in income. It costs nearly £7000 a month to run the club and maintain the grounds and pitches, so while expenditure has been cut to a minimum, survival over the winter will be a real challenge.
Before Covid we were working on plans to update the clubhouse, to potentially increase the number of squash courts, to make changing facilities more comfortable, to protect our pitches from some of the damage experienced in recent years, and to increase the capacity for community use of the building and grounds. We need your support to survive the winter, so we can generate income again next summer, and resume our improvement plans.
If you can help us recoup our losses and keep going this year, next year we can work towards:
Contributing to the Community
Our facilities are open for community use - you may well walk or run on our grounds, or have visited the club for a boot fair, wedding or party. The Club hosts an annual community fireworks and bonfire night, and you might have had a good laugh at our floats in the Hythe Venetian Fete, or cheered club runners across the line in the Round The Houses Run. Members actively support local charities, most recently The Rainbow Run in support of the NHS.
We've built partnerships with local schools and community organisations, particularly Shepway Sports Trust, and have loved hosting Kent School Games events for primary school children.
This year we began a new partnership with 'The Shed', a project offering bike hire and cycle journeys for people with learning disabilities. We look forward to welcoming them on site shortly.
While we are on the edge of a financial cliff now, the club has survived bombing in World War II, a devastating fire in 2004... so we are determined to survive Covid in 2020.
Please support us by donating or choosing a reward - every pound will count.
Thank you
Sport England: Active Together has provided £10,000 of match funding