Group teams join forces to support families in need over Christmas

Colleagues from across the group made an extra special effort in December to organise food and gift collections for families in need during December.

Supporting local charities, including foodbanks and homeless shelters, each business helped out their local communities, including setting up food donation boxes in offices, purchasing gifts for children, paying for Christmas meals and making corporate donations. This includes:

• Garic supporting 13 colleague picked charities to receive over £15,000 in donations to support good causes close to their seven UK-wide depots
• BFS colleagues holding food bank collections in all their main UK offices
• BFS Ireland colleagues hosting a raffle for a children’s hospice that raised over 2,230 Euros
• Colleagues from Bibby Marine, BLG head office and BFS donating 150 selection boxes and spending the afternoon volunteering at the Whitechapel Distribution Centre
• Garic colleagues donating hundreds of toys to children’s charities and holding a Christmas Jumper Day
• BFS Poland colleagues taking part in ‘Santa Town’ which donated toys to children

A few quotes from around the group:

Martina Shannon, BFS Customer Experience Manager, Ireland: “I just want to say a HUGE thank you to everyone who came on board to assist, weather is was donating something to the raffle, gathering raffle donations from friends, family or local businesses, buying a ticket or selling tickets to friends and family, nothing has gone unnoticed.”

Karen McGarry  Bibby Marine Finance Officer: “Wow what an experience volunterring at The Whitechapel Centre. I was blown away by the hard work these guys put in for not only the homeless, but for other less fortunate people.  I will definitely be volunteering for them again throughout the year, and came away with a feeling of purpose on my time spent there.”

Martin Gardner, Garic Falkirk Depot Manager: “It’s not until you look back that you realise what we achieved during December! Working together not only within Garic but as the Bibby Group, in what is the most challenging month for many financially and time wise which makes the response we had even more extraordinary.”