Lymington Dot Com in association with DREAMS COME TRUE presents:
THE DREAMS WEEKEND
December 8th & 9th 2007 - LYMINGTON
HOTLINE - 0870 330 4460 - Get Involved Now!
****HOT OFF THE PRESS**** - ICE RINK CONFIRMED!!!
Dear Everyone,
Lymington Dot Com (www.lymington.com) in association with Dreams Come True (www.dctc.org.uk) is currently organising a stunning weekend of family entertainment in Lymington on Saturday 8th & Sunday 9th of December 2007 and we are hoping you can work with us to help make it a huge success for all involved.
Dreams Come True is a wonderful charity which makes the dreams of terminally or seriously ill children come true. They have a host of celebrity supporters including Dame Kelly Holmes and Emma Forbes who are actively supporting our event.
We have been working hard with key organisations in the media to acquire the requisite permissions and some major local and national sponsors and so far we have confirmed the following:
The Quay Association incorporating the majority of traders and business owners in Gosport Street, Quay Hill, The Quay and Captain’s Row are transforming the area into Harry Potter’s ‘Diagon Alley’, where a whole host of events and attractions have already been confirmed. The infamous King’s Head will become The Leaky Cauldron and alongside fantastic and authentic street decoration the owners are embracing the theme with fancy dress, live owls, face painting, broomstick making classes, magicians, wizards, witches. We have yet to confirm a ‘Hogwart’s Express’ Service from Brockenhurst but we’re working on that right now. We have already had confirmation that the railway station will be decorated in theme. Similarly, we hope imminently to secure permission to close The Quay car park that weekend and then have already organised a young children’s themed fairground area including a Hogwart’s bouncy castle and other rides and attractions which we are aiming to be under cover in a sponsored marquee.
The Angel Courtyard retailers are helping us transform their area into Narnia, and we are currently liaising with Disney in the UK and the US to secure a variety of attractions including props, snow machines and possibly even cast members from the film. We have already confirmed various street entertainers and decorations and all the businesses will be running their own fundraising activities including mulled wine and hot chestnuts for Mum’s & Dad’s.
The St Thomas Street Traders incorporating the businesses in St Thomas Street are currently working with us to create an Alice in Wonderland Theme and we have been offered tremendous support from various global organisations to facilitate this.
The businesses around the one-way system including No.11 The Salon and others are re-creating a ‘Dickens’ theme and we are working hard to develop an Oliver Twist styled Victorian London atmosphere.
We have now confirmed and reserved following approval from The Local Council and a major sponsor an ice rink which will now either be situated on Bath Road on the area adjacent to the Bandstand or on Lymington Quay. The sponsor has already provided significant funds on top of this and access to a substantial email database of over 40,000 people.
We have booked Stanwell House on the evening of Friday 7th December 2007 where Lymington Dot Com is hosting a fabulous auction dinner and we already have a fantastic array of auction prizes including for example a training day with Dame Kelly Holmes, 4X4 weekends, shooting on a local estate, Rib Hire, Spa, Days and some truly amazing top prizes to be revealed later. There will be a very special dinner and will be designed to attract, first and foremost, those with generous and deep pockets who are most likely to bid highly for the fantastic prizes on offer.
Waitrose have kindly donated their forecourt and we are in discussions with numerous organisations about a feature attraction which could be a famous car, celebrity signing pitch, simulator etc. We have various options and when we have chosen which one will be located there, the others will be circulated around the town.
We have just started approaching High Street retailers and businesses and will be establishing this area into our very own version of ‘Lapland’ where Christmas themes will abound. In much the same way as above all the businesses will hopefully embrace the event and we have already secured contributions from some businesses towards the street entertainment, decorations and promotion. The Lymington and Pennington District Council has kindly offered to encourage all Market Traders on Saturday to dress themselves and their stores in theme on that Saturday and initial responses are overwhelmingly enthusiastic.
Elsewhere in the town we are canvassing the Marine Industry to take part by collectively sponsoring another area yet to be confirmed, but we have had very encouraging offers of support for a Hundred Acre Wood, Toytown, etc. This is likely to be in the area adjacent to the Royal Lymington Yacht Club and The Town Sailing Club to be confirmed.
Initial approaches to local schools, organisations and larger businesses have been very encouraging with most of them offering to run a variety of fundraising activities for Dreams Come True leading up to and during the event. Many are also providing timetabled attractions as well during that weekend.
brief8™ is working with Dreams Come True to create a fabulous benchmark website dedicated specifically to the event and this will provide a platform for all the information anyone will need as well as a platform for advertising opportunities the proceeds of which will all be donated to Dreams Come True. This will be launched imminently.
So how can you help?
We have detailed most of what we have already confirmed above, but should point out that there are also some incredibly exciting contributions, events and celebrity attendances that we cannot yet mention for various reasons. Any event like this relies on everyone involved putting vested interests to one side for a while and focusing wholly on a great family weekend in support of a truly special cause. To that end and in that spirit we are canvassing support from anyone who can assist us in making the event successful. These are the various areas where we are looking to secure your support and if you feel you would like to get involved, please email Hannah via hannah@lymington.com, call us on 0870 330 4460 or complete the form online at www.lymington.com/dreamsform.
We need your help with, but not limited to, the following:
Retailers – If you have a business with street frontage especially within the centre of town we are hoping for your support. All businesses so far taking part have contributed £100 initially towards funding street entertainers, decorations and promotion. They have all agreed to follow the particular theme for their geographic position as described above and as a result will benefit from the promotional material which will incorporate a Dreams Come True Weekend ‘Map of the Town!’, an extensive PR campaign through national heavyweight PR company The Remarkable Group and all associated advertising where appropriate. Lymington Dot Com will also be offering advertising opportunities within the comprehensive brochures available during the event which will also feature a one-off ‘2007 Super-Directory’ of the whole town, again with all profits going to Dreams Come True.
We hope all Retailers and central shop front based businesses, however small or large will dress in appropriate fancy dress for their location within the town, help us with a modest contribution towards costs, organise their own fundraising activities or special promotions like selling mulled wine and mince pies to donating percentage of profits.
Major Sponsors – If you are an owner/ manager of a larger business in Lymington then we would be very keen to make sure we have spoken to you to canvass for your support and also of course to make sure you have been given every opportunity to be seen at the forefront of this significant event. The PR spin off is potentially significant as this is the first of its kind and scale anywhere in the Country and we have been working with the Charity to ensure it is infinitely scalable and can be replicated in many other towns. For that reason their PR company will be looking to promote the event both before and after to as wider audiences as possible. To download a sponsorship application please click here! SPONSORSHIP FORM .PDF - To download a version in Word click here! SPONSORSHIP FORM .WORD
Community Associations, Schools, Clubs, and Societies etc. – If you run any of the aforementioned, then we are very keen to work with you to organise a whole host of fundraising activities. We are also very keen to build the timetable of events throughout the whole weekend which will be publicised widely in all promotional material, especially our Dreams Come True Weekend Map and Programme. Where possible we will support all your efforts with local/ possibly national publicity for your particular group and work with you to incorporate the amazing assets we have at our disposal including celebrity appearances, permissions from Warner’s, Disney, JK Rowling etc. and props and equipment.
Individual Supporters – Any event of this scale relies heavily on a wonderful bunch of people who are prepared to roll their sleeves up and muck in without expecting any reward other than the satisfaction of taking part in something which provides memorable family fun and irreplaceable opportunities for the Charity concerned. We need people who will happily slot into any role which needs doing, such as collections, co-ordinating, marshalling, security, and decoration. So far we have over twenty young ladies all happy to dress as ‘wish fairies’ and help collect monies around the town. Please let us know if you might be available to work with us during this weekend and in what capacity. We will be looking to provide a variety of ‘staff’ boltholes and infrastructure during the weekend and afterwards will certainly find a way of saying a massive thank you to make it all worthwhile.
Please contact us Jan or Hannah on 0870 330 4460 even if you just want to sound things out. We do need to start pinning things down and have various deadlines including of course the promotional material which, if you wish to be included, has a copy date which is in only four weeks.
Thank you for reading this far and I hope you are as excited as we all are. Lymington has not seen this kind of family fun, local pride and community spirit for some time and we hope that this event will help not only provide that but will raise heaps of money for some very deserving children. May all our dreams come true!
Lastly, PLEASE PLEASE forward this LINK (http://www.lymington.com/dreamsweekend) to as many people as you possibly can to help us spread the word!!!
Thank you so much,
Yours sincerely,
The LDC Team
