twestival local - Tweet.Meet.Give. - March 24, 2011

Guildford Twestival- The Aftermath

After much anticipation, the wait was finally over and on Thursday the 24th of March, the first Guildford Twestival took place and was a huge success! Ninety Twestivalites attended enjoying the Champagne, cakes and canapés at the stylish Wild Garlic Restaurant and Bar, raising over an astonishing £3,700 for CHASE hospice.

The evening was organised by Craig & Sarah Cooper, owners of Guildford-based recruitment consultancy, Clever Recruitment. Delighted with the total, Sarah commented;

“When we first signed up to organise Guildford Twestival we hoped to raise £2,000. To exceed that initial target, to almost double it, feels incredible and is a testament to the generosity and support of all those involved the event – from friends and family to clients and candidates to local people and businesses who just wanted to contribute however they could. We'd like to make a special mention to our friend, Jennifer Masters, who helped with the organisation we couldn't have coped without her!"

The Twestivities!

After a chance to mingle and enjoy a glass of champagne, courtesy of Chris Connor, the owner of Wild Garlic, the evening started with Lissa Martin, an ambassador for CHASE, giving an insightful and personal account of all the brilliant work that CHASE's local Hospice, Christopher's, does for life limited children and their families in the Guildford area. The very talented Penny Nicholls and Rob Webster provided fantastic live music throughout the evening and Ian Gray amazed the crowd with his close magic tricks, - how he managed to get a £10 note from inside a kiwi is still beyond us!

The long-awaited luxury raffle was a roaring success with 38 luck winners choosing fabulous prizes from the cornucopia of donations kindly given from local Guildford businesses, raising a whopping £1,100!

However the highlight of the evening has to be last minute auction for the surprise donation of dinner for 6 at home, kindly donated by the Wild Garlic team. Bidding was tense between Stephen Frost and Phil Gee with Phil eventually winning with an incredibly generous bid of £260! Thank you, Phil!

Finally the silent auction closed the show with five fabulous lots donated by Kate Griffin Photography, Richer Sounds, Howdens Joinery Co, Sophocles Alexiou Photography and Custard Communications raising over £850! Co-organiser Craig added;

“The evening was a great success! CHASE is such a fantastic charity and we are delighted to be able to contribute to their cause. We had such amazing support not only on the night but in the build up to the event. The generosity of the people and businesses of Guildford never ceased to amaze us – so many wonderful raffle and auction prizes were donated and so many people were keen to help in the organisation or the smooth running of the evening. Both Sarah and I would like to extend our sincere thanks to all of them”

Special Thanks

There are so many people to thank for their help towards the night, notably Chris Connor and the team at Wild Garlic for the stylish venue and for providing champagne, canapés and goodie bags which contained, amongst other treats, the most delicious sausages I have tasted in a long time. A particular mention goes to Cath at Little Cake Factory for her contribution of delicious cup cakes, complete with the Guildford Twestival logo, and for her sweet tweet treats: cake pops - beautiful bird shaped treats on the outside with soft, rich chocolate cake on the inside!

And of course not forgetting our talented team of volunteers: Fiona Fitzpatrick, Martyn Stead, Thom Gibbons, Paul Bridgland, Ingrid Weel (for these fantastic photos), Jack Newman, Drew Harding, Adele Mitchell, Lynzi Ashworth, Claire Price, Sophie Grant and Luci Lyne.

You are all stars!

Until next time...

With Guildford Twestival now just over a week ago it's back to what we do best so, until it's Twestival time again, you can find us at Clever Recruitment. Don't be a stranger...!

Sarah, Craig and Jennifer