Is it Friday? Pease say it’s Friday. Readers, it has been A Week.
But if you think running the social media account for a charity can be tricky sometimes, take a look at how tough it is being the voice of tea. It’s no secret that the British public have strong opinions about tea, as demonstrated by the abuse hurled at Yorkshire Tea because it is the tea of choice at the Treasury.
Despite insisting that it really is very difficult to handpick customers some users would not give up.
“Sue you’re shouting at tea,” became an instant social media meme, Diary can’t find anyone who has turned this into a fundraising tea-shirt, but surely it’s only a matter of time.
It was heartening to see that rival tea brand PG Tips was on hand to offer support, though coffee’s absence from the furore has been noted.
Anyway, back in Charity Land badly drawn pets (that’s a fundraising campaign, not the name of an indie band) are having an impact and one charity suddenly has a huge haul of designer clothes.
Badly drawn pets
Over in America the Wisconsin Humane Society has come up with an amazing way to raise money. In return for a $15 (about £12) it will custom draw a picture of your pet, hat tip to Joe Freeman for alerting one of Diary’s colleagues to this story.
The charity launched the campaign on Facebook, saying: “It’s time to put the 'fun' back in fundraising… if you donate $15 to the animals at WHS, we’ll draw your pet. The catch? We’re a whole lot better at caring for animals than we are at drawing them.”
While some of its staff and volunteers are “extremely talented artists”, most are “someone who can’t draw their way out of a paper bag”. The only stipulation was that there should be no more than one pet per picture, which is a shame for anyone with a herd of sheep.
Diary is very much here for fundraising that features this level of jeopardy.
Sadly the charity has been overwhelmed and can no longer fulfil requests. But the good news is the campaign raised $12,000.
But if any readers have photos of their pets that they would like drawn badly then Diary will do its best*. Tweet @CivilSocietyUK and you can then decide whether our efforts are of a high enough standard for you to make a donation to a charity of your choice.
*photos tweeted after 5pm today are likely to be ignored as Diary will have left the building and will have forgotten all about this on Monday morning.
Designer clothes haul for charity shop
This week the Independent reported that one charity shop in Largs, Scotland had received 400 bags in donations of designer clothes and accessories from the family of a lady who had recently passed away. (Thanks to Russell Benson on Twitter for highlighting the story.) Diary is guessing there is ten items per bag, so that’s 4,000 items.
The newspaper reports that “the majority of which still have tags attached” and they are estimated to be worth tens of thousands.
Diary has so many questions:
- Where is the shop going to put all this stuff?
- Why was most of it unworn?
- Will the town now be the best dressed town in Scotland or will everyone follow the lady’s lead and preserve the clothes in their original condition?
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