Promoting the Cornhill Companions (360G-OCF-A504214)

We would like to increase the take up of our services and achieve a greater impact in terms of how many individual people we are able to befriend and provide help to. We have an aim to increase our number of clients to 100 or more in the Banbury area. To do so, we would like to produce more publicity leaflets and distribute them more widely. Our quotes for reprinting locally are around £400.00. We would also like to advertise more widely e.g. in putting adverts in the local press, radio stations. We held stalls at events such as Banbury Show during 2018 and would like to continue to do so as an effective way of meeting potential new volunteers and the costs associated with these advertisements and events are approx. £150 per annum. We have recently completed a website to further promote our services and this has a small cost attached to running it each year, approx. £80.00. You will appreciate that our group has a number of admin tasks to complete in relation to the services we provide and in recruiting new volunteers, such as DBS checks, application forms. Training is very important too in making sure that all of our volunteers are well versed in issues such as data protection, dementia awareness and health and safety. During the last four months we have taken on a part time staff member (for no more than 3 hours per week) to help with admin and organising training. We would like to continue this arrangement, especially as it means that our volunteers' time is spent almost entirely on visiting people. To continue our training programme and with the work of a part time staff member, we would like to use approx. £600 of any grant funding that we may receive from you. During 2018 we held a tea party, inviting and treating all of our clients to afternoon tea. It was a very enjoyable event. We provided transport for those who needed it. We would like to repeat this event, or something similar, during 2019 because many of our clients said that it was a great opportunity for them to go out to a social event and chat to and make friends with other clients - we felt this was one day when we knew for certain that none of our clients was at home with no one to talk to. The cost of holding another tea party including transport is approximately £250.00. Addressing the need in our area seems to us to be a simple equation i.e. the greater the number of clients we are able to 'match up' with a volunteer who visits clients regularly and/or takes them out shopping or to a social event, the fewer the number of people in our area who are completely isolated and alone. Many of our clients to date have become known to us through word of mouth and we feel it is important for us to increase publicity and general awareness of what we can offer so that potential clients (and their neighbours and associates) can seek help from our group. We have publicised our services to social services and other voluntary groups and support services and we have taken on a number of referrals from them. Those organisations have said to us that there are many more people that they could refer to us but they are mindful of how many volunteers we have and our current capacity. We would like to increase our volunteer base as much as we can during 2019 so that we can meet the need. In addition, we are aware that there are neighbourhoods in Banbury - some with a high incidence of older people as residents - where we have few clients as yet, e.g. Bretch Hill and parts of Grimsbury - both areas with a higher than average level of deprivation. We would like to publicise our services in those areas - and seek both volunteers and clients - so that we can try and meet any needs there are in those neighbourhoods. You will know that there is a significant Polish population in Banbury and some ethnic minority groups such as the Asian and Chinese communities - we would like to publicise our services to those groups in addition to the areas that we are already working in.