Brighton office workers help collect £43k for Sport Relief

Staff at a Brighton contact centre collected more than £43,000 for Sport Relief while colleagues raised a further £1,700 for the charity

Volunteers at Domestic and General (D&G) in Queen Square, Brighton, collected £43,678 in just five hours as they manned the phones for the televised appeal.

Between them 200 employees gave up 653 hours of their own time for the national fundraising drive last Friday (23 March).

They were joined by Deputy Mayor Geoff Wells who supported the event and took the first call of the night.

Councillor Wells thanked D&G staff for supporting the charity’s work which helps tackle world poverty.

Dozens of staff also tried to break a world record for indoor rowing. Although they missed out on the record, they raised £1,762 for Sport Relief in the process.

The event marked the culmination of a week of activities in aid of Sport Relief at the Queen Square contact centre which provides jobs for more than 700 people.

During the week staff climbed the height of Everest on a step machine, cycled 1,667 miles – the distance between each of the company’s European offices – and one employee single-handedly raised £450 by shaving her head.

Ben Dale-Gough, site operations manager at D&G, said: “Sport Relief is a shining example of a charity inspiring people to take action.

“We’ve been working with the organisation for six years and in that time our employees have become more aware of its work and the issues it aims to combat.

“We’ve been amazed by the growing level of engagement within our company alone, so much so our employees have been involved in more fundraising activities this year than ever before.

“When the first call came in there was genuine excitement and cheers from the teams on the phones.”