Few Real Ale enthusiasts in England will be unaware of Farnham Beer Exhibition (Beerex) and the fame of this event has spread much further afield. Thousands of imbibers descend on the town for a few days in Spring to sample the year’s selection of fine ales, ciders and perries. Beerex is organised jointly by Farnham Lions Club and CAMRA, and held in the historic Farnham Maltings. We usually raise in excess of £25,000 from the event, all of which is returned to the community’s needy.
Farnham Lions organised the Farnham Carnival for many years, not so much as a fund raising venture but simply to give a bit of pleasure to the community. Since 2000 we have combined forces with another Farnham service club, The Hedgehogs, acquired some generous sponsors, and greatly expanded the scope of the event. This has been so successful that, after making donations to participating schools and charities, each club makes a useful amount for its own causes. The community seems to enjoy it more, too!
We hold an annual Charity Golf Day, in conjunction with Hindhead Golf Club and local sponsors. This event is immensely popular and attracts sponsorship from several generous local businesses. Now in its twelfth year, the event has gone from strength to strength. Abbeyfield, home for the elderly, Frensham Pond Sailing Club "Sailability", Bells Piece Cheshire Home, Helen Arkell Dyslexia Centre have, amongst others, been the beneficiaries of useful sums of money raised thus. In 2007 we raised over £9,000 to fit out a new library for the Abbey School. Incidentally, the golf is always great!
The Frensham Pond Sailability Safety Boat "Lionheart"
In 2007 we initiated a new venture, inspired and driven by one of our newer members, Keith Harris, and named "Easter Eggstravaganza". This involves supplying large, high quality, Easter Eggs, each with a fluffy lion, a collecting box and a 100 choice name board into local pubs, hotels, hospitals, surgeries, etc.The idea is that punters will donate £1 to choose a name for the lion from the board. When the board is full, a draw is held and the lucky winner takes the egg and the lion, and we take around £100 a time. Last year we raised over £6000 for Surrey Air Ambulance by this means. For 2008, keeping the same beneficiary, we have co-opted some of our neighbouring Lions Clubs into the scheme, and hope to raise around £15,000.
We invariably support a number of local fetes with our tombola, football, hoopla or "pick-a card" stands and contribute our proceeds, plus a bit more, to their causes. A relatively new feature of our participation in these events is our "Cakes for Charity" stall, offering the highest quality fruit cakes at very reasonable prices.
Tin rattling around Christmas time is also an essential part of our fund raising endeavours.
In the Lions, business must be mixed with pleasure whenever possible, so we arrange fun evenings such as the now famous Bavarian (Oompah!) Night. If you missed the last Oompah event on 6th November 2004, commiserations, it was a great night and, despite a slightly depleted audience due to the clash with Farnham Fireworks Fiesta, raised over £800.
All in all we expect to raise over £50,000 in
an average year, and have great fun doing it!
Non - monetary resources include food, collected from
better off families in the community
around Christmas time. This is sorted, parceled up and re - distributed to those
less fortunate, often making the difference between misery and inner
warmth on Christmas Day.
