Contrary to popular belief, RDA groups do not receive any running costs from RDA National and instead must pay them for Group Membership and Insurance. Therefore Samber must organise its own fundraising to cover our running costs, which also includes the hire of our indoor school/ponies, our insurance and training. Over the past few years, the vast majority of money raised has been through the friends and families of the volunteers who already give up their time each week to run SAMBER.
Sadly whilst we were closed due to Covid nearly all of our fundraising opportunities ceased, yet we continued to support the riding school where we are based. We are very grateful to our families, friends, work colleagues and clients who made donations to Samber, whilst we were closed, in the hope that we would be able to re-open eventually. Hopefully now that we have re-opened we will be able to fundraise again very soon!
Previously, our volunteers have run marathons, half-marathons, taken part in Swimathons and on RDA’s 40th Birthday, one volunteer even jumped out of a plane and helped raise money for both SAMBER and the RDA National Office. We get creative; knitting and baking goods to sell at various Christmas Fairs which have proved to be both successful and a fun day out for the volunteers in attendance. We have hosted Race Nights and our very popular Quiz Nights, which have now become an eagerly-anticipated annual event!
SAMBER has also been fortunate enough to have been supported by the Waitrose Community Matters Scheme and was supported by the Goldsworth Park Branch as well as the Soroptimist International Woking Division. We are also very grateful to the Kingston Ex-Table Group who kindly agreed to support us through tough times and with their help we were able to purchase a new mounting block which was an absolute necessity.
In October 2016 we entered a SAMBER Team (Vikki, Sue, Jan, Pennie and her daughter Sam, plus Pennie’s friends Ann & Mavis) to compete in the Woking Rotary Club Swimathon and completed 137 lengths!! And we’ve kept swimming, see below for more Swimathon updates!
In 2017 the Woking Lions donated money for a sheepskin saddle and some new rainbow reins which are just fabulous for our riders.
Also in 2017, the Hoebridge Golf Club chose SAMBER as one of their chosen charities and set out to hold various fundraising events throughout the year. We entered two teams in the Hoebridge Golf Club Charity Day on 18th July where we also had a SAMBER stand with volunteers available to answer questions about our group. In November, Pennie King, our Treasurer, and Vikki Kitcat, our Safeguarding Officer, were lucky enough to attend the Presentation Evening and were presented us with a huge cheque – a record-breaking about for SAMBER to receive! We are incredibly grateful for their generosity and really can’t thank them enough for all their support.
On Friday 27th April 2018, SAMBER was lucky enough to be selected as a nominated charity for the rescheduled Quiz Night being held at the Hanger’s Cafe, Fairoaks Airport, in Chobham. A total of £112.91 was raised which we put to good use to take some of our oldest children to the Regional Challenge Day in May, where they were able to compete against other RDA Groups! Thank you to everyone involved!
You can see pictures from the Regional Challenge Day here!
In 2018, the Trefoil Guild chose to support the RDA and we were most grateful to the Goldsworth Park Trefoil Guild branch who supported SAMBER as their local RDA Group. We were able to purchase an extra sheepskin saddle with their donation.
In October 2019 our SAMBER Team took part in the Woking Rotary Club Swimathon. Our team consisted of Samber volunteers Vikki Kitcat, Sue Reeves, Sue Russell, Jan Davies, Carol Golsby, Nicki Dumbreck – and Pennie King’s daughter and granddaughter, Sam and Emily Tuck. Congratulations to Emily for completing this challenge on what was her 9th birthday! The Team completed 105 lengths between them! The Charities being supported by Woking Rotary Swimathon in 2019 were : Mayors Charities (Your Sanctuary & Women’s Support Centre); Woking and Sam Beare Hospice; Transform Housing & Support; Horsell Village School (Outdoor learner-centre); Samber (Riding for the disabled); Woking Street Angels; Woking Shop Mobility.
From L-R: Vikki Kitcat, Sue Russell, Nicki Dumbreck, Sue Reeve, Sam Tuck and her daughter Emily, Jan Davies and Carol Golsby
Thank you to everyone who has supported SAMBER recently – we really couldn’t keep going without you.
If you are able to donate any money or items that we could use, sell or barter, please contact
Penny King
Our Registered Charity Number is: 1074208
We would be sincerely grateful for all your help. Thank you.