Get Set 4 Tennis beat its £12,000 target by almost 80%, raising more than £21,500 for SEND, learning disability and dementia-friendly tennis in Hillingdon.
A tennis organisation that teaches more than 1,100 people a week, including children with special educational needs, has raised more than £21,500 to take its sessions further into Hillingdon.
Get Set 4 Tennis set out to raise £12,000 through its Beyond the Baseline campaign on Crowdfunder. It beat that by almost 80%.
The money will pay for more SEND tennis sessions, a new programme for players with learning disabilities and dementia-friendly tennis for local residents and the people who care for them.
Where the money came from
Suntory Beverage & Food GB&I, the Lucozade and Ribena company with its head office in Uxbridge, matched £4,127 of the public’s pledges through its Together for Good Fund. Its staff added a further £840 through the company’s Employee Giving scheme, under which every employee in Great Britain gets a £70 voucher to give to a live project in the fund. Other funding partners made up the rest alongside individual supporters.
When we looked at the fund in September, the campaign page showed it had funded on 12 July and that Sport England’s Movement Fund and BA Better World were among those other partners.
“The support we received through match funding gave our campaign a fantastic boost and helped us completely surpass our original goal,” said Lisa Wildman, who co-founded Get Set 4 Tennis.
Who it is for
The organisation works across Hertfordshire and neighbouring communities, Hillingdon among them. Its sessions are aimed at people who are often left out of sport: children with SEND, people with learning disabilities, older residents and families who cannot easily afford to play.
The company says the funding has also let it reach more young people aged 11 to 16, who it describes as facing increasing pressure from school, exams and their mental wellbeing.
“It’s about bringing people together”
For Lisa, the money was only part of it.
“It’s about bringing people together,” she said. “It gives our members, families, volunteers and local supporters a reason to get involved and feel proud of what we’re achieving together.”
She said the campaign had put the organisation in front of people who had not heard of it.
“It has been a fantastic opportunity to raise the profile of Get Set 4 Tennis within our local community and showcase everything we offer, particularly the opportunities we provide for people who may not otherwise have access to support.”
Her advice to other groups
The same fund still has £89,000 available for projects in and around Hillingdon, the company says, with match funding of up to £10,000 for charities, sports clubs, community groups and voluntary organisations. Lisa is urging other local groups to try it.
“Don’t underestimate how much your community wants to support you,” she said. “Crowdfunding can bring people together, raise vital funds and, just as importantly, help more people discover the incredible work you are doing locally.”
The match is not a grant you fill in a form for: a group has to run its own Crowdfunder campaign and hit its target for the money to arrive. The conditions, and the other Hillingdon projects the fund has backed, are in our guide to the Together for Good Fund. The company says the fund will put up to £2.5 million into grassroots projects across the UK and Ireland by 2030.
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