Hi Gorgeous O2e lovelies, the year has started with a BIG BANG with the O2e Launch Night on 16^th Jan at the offices of EDF Man.  Great to see so many of you again and I believe we had near record numbers.   Another fantastic evening hosted by the Committee, Rash and the team.  2019 was spectacular; you undertook 45 EVENTS (smashing the target of 30) and you raised £160,000 which smashed us through £2.5m donated since start up and allowed us to give £25,000 to each of our fabulous charities on your behalf.  See below the presentation photographs to each of our six 2019 charities – look at the smiles and trust me when I say how profoundly grateful they are for these large, unencumbered donations, which mean so much to them and to the terminally ill and disabled children who they help every day. 

2020 Targets:
Drum roll……………:

• £175,000 to be donated at the end of the year
• 50 EVENTS!! 
• 50 newbies to O2e – doing events and fundraising

The key to 2020 is to recruit new people into the O2e family, allowing us to access new “donor pools” (as they say) and increasing the average amounts raised per event.  What can you do to help?  Do everything you did in 2019), but also invite along a couple of friends to your event (or to another O2e event) who have never done stuff for O2e or who did stuff a while ago and have fallen by the wayside.  Get them to do your event with you or even better, to do an event themselves.  And don’t forget to get yourself and them signed up for The Giving Machine (see details below).  This is FREE MONEY to O2e the goods don’t cost you any more and it’s all secure!!

How are we doing in 2020?
Early days, still in January, but the momentum from last year is continuing with your help.  Ladies and gentlemen, we have 43 events already declared and more than £18k in the bank as we build towards this years targets.  What a FANTASTIC start!!!  We also have some major events already in the offering; still under wraps is the Possee ride for 2020, details to come but if you might be interested then keep 6^th and 7^th June free in your busy diaries.  Still under wraps is a spectacular gala dinner which will be nothing short of spectacular (did I say spectacular twice?) – again if you might be interested then keep the weekend of 21 November free.
Of course there’s Big Kev’s bike ride to Amsterdam via Dover, Dunkirk, Bruges and Rotterdam.  Ladies and Gentlemen, I think the most we have ever had on a bike ride is 106 and as of today, with 7 months still to go, we have 96 registered riders.  Yes, 96.  Get yourselves registered by clicking here before it’s too late.
Not to mention Ollies golf day on 2^nd June, Plewsy’s 5555 challenge, Nira’s quiz night, Sue Smith’s Thames walk on May 23rd, BRC’s 5 Hills Challenge on Sunday 12 July, the Hooters nutty crazy stuff to be announced and the World Bog Snorkelling Championships on 30 and 31 August.  Plus lots and lots more….  Don’t forget to send me your event(s) for 2020, get a friend or friends involved and sign up for the Giving Machine (see below).

The Giving Machine

CLICK – SHOP – GIVE TO O2e FOR FREE!
Some of you may be familiar with The Giving Machine but I’m guessing there are many of you that haven’t heard of it, don’t really understand how it works or perhaps are wary of it because it sounds too good to be true! There is no doubt that with your help the Giving Machine will help us to achieve our fundraising targets in 2020 with your help.  This could be extremely lucrative for O2e as it is for other charities. 
The Giving Machine was founded in 2007 and has grown quickly, being awarded the Social Enterprise Mark in 2010 and registered charity status in 2014.
Here’s How It Works:
The Giving Machine receives a commission every time it refers a customer to an online retailer. Once you have created your Giving Machine Account, which literally takes a couple of minutes, you simply visit any one of over 2,200 retailers via their website. That’s the key – don’t go straight to Amazon, eBay, Booking.com, Next, M&S, Asos, Wiggle etc, ALWAYS go in via your Giving Machine account. Once you have made your purchase, the retailer will send a small commission back to The Giving Machine and they will in turn forward up to 70% of that commission on to your nominated charity, ie O2e. This process is generally known as affiliate marketing, it is completely free to you the shopper and to O2e and there are 2,200 retailers to chose from. 
Download the App for quick and easy shopping and giving!
Up to now, just 46 of us O2e-ers have registered with The Giving Machine and with O2e as our cause.  Between us, we have raised £788.16 – imagine what we could be earning if EVERY ONE of us did our online shopping via The Giving Machine! O2e even has its own unique quick sign-up code – 59312.
I cannot stress to you the importance of signing up to this incredible charity – please tell your friends, your family, your children’s school and your work colleagues about it too and ask if they would consider choosing O2e as their cause. Let’s see if we can get 200 people registered in the next 6 weeks. 
Thanks for taking the time to read this – if you’d like any further information, please contact our resident experts, Caroline Keiley Smith carolineksmith38@hotmail.co.uk and Sue Smith, at ​sue48smith@icloud.com   

Lots of loveChairman DD Big Cheese xx
07764682332
dd@O2e.org.uk