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We are so proud to have worked with The Hollow Lane Club as our charity of the year, raising £2,000 and supporting this important charity with marketing and PR consultancy services.

The Exeter-based charity, supporting children with complex needs, has been running for more than 20 years. It supports young people and their families by offering weekend, after school and summer holiday clubs. These clubs offer tailored play-based activities with the help of dedicated specialists, offering essential respite to families in need.

At One Voice, we’ve been honoured to collaborate with the amazing team at Hollow Lane Club.  We’ve delivered a range of marketing and PR consultancy as part of our support. Here’s a glimpse of our journey together:
– Created a communications plan to promote Hollow Lane Club and its invaluable services.
– Hosted successful fundraising events – a bake sale that raised over £100 and a 22k walk from Exeter to Exmouth, raising over £1,300!
– Distributed 3 impactful press releases to spread the word about the incredible work of Hollow Lane Club.
– Organised and participated in a photoshoot to capture imagery for future marketing and promotion.
– Provided draft social media posts and advice on utilising them to generate donations and interest.
– Designed a Hollow Lane Club branded newsletter with guidance on accessing and using it for stakeholders.

It’s been a brilliant journey, and we’re proud to have played a part in supporting such a wonderful charity. Thank you to The Hollow Lane Club for the vital work you do!

When tasked by the client to raise awareness of the new festive offering in Princesshay, including enchanting new lights and an independent pop-up market to the cosy Antler Inn, Charity Christmas trees, and Santa Claus’s workshop, we rose to the challenge 💪

Delivering a multichannel campaign spanning organic social media, PR, partnership and influencer marketing, we invited people to ‘Discover the Wonder.’

With ambitious targets established, key messages agreed, and a long list of content to capture, not only did we successfully meet all our targets, we surpassed them🙌👏

Highlights included:

*Top performing organic content for Facebook and Instagram.

*Seeing an increased following on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.

*Securing third-party endorsement and additional reach from the influencer and partnership marketing and events.

*Reaching new audiences by working with new influencers whose primary channel is TikTok with a combined following of 66,000.

*Organising and hosting two influencer events showcasing retail and dining, unveiling the new Santa Claus workshop.

Overall the PR and marketing campaign was a great success and we were especially pleased to have exceeded the ambitious targets.

The next challenge?
Exceed the 2024 targets.

Looking for your first role in PR, marketing and events?

If so, we’ve got the perfect opportunity for you to join the talented and ambitious One Voice team. The ideal candidate will be interested in creating content, like meeting new people and have a keen eye for detail.

To find out more about the role and apply click here.

Deadline 1 January 2024.

This year we’ve chosen the Hollow Lane Club as our charity of the year.

Here’s a blog written by one of our team members about what the charity means to her and her family. She uses a pseudonym for her daughter. 

Holiday Club 

I got a newsletter from an organisation that provides information to families with disabled children recently. The introduction included this line: ‘for many families the summer holidays are a chance to recharge and take stock’. I of course expected the ‘but’ to follow, where they then acknowledge how very different this is for families of disabled children. But it didn’t. They left it at that. I found myself feeling angry that they did not understand the huge weight of the summer holidays for families of disabled children. It was of course a well-meaning newsletter, likely dashed off in a hurry; but the anger I felt was reflective of the enormous stress that the holidays bring.

A report from the children’s disability charity, Contact, and another from Coram, in the last few months have highlighted the woeful lack of provision available for disabled children over the summer holidays. The Contact report found that 9 out of 10 families have been unable to find a holiday club or activity for their disabled child this summer. 9 in 10. The consequences? Confused, stressed, frustrated children; extreme pressure on families; parent carers being unable to access work – a perfect storm of looming crises behind closed doors. It’s a shocking statistic to the layperson reading it. To parent carers, it likely sounds painfully familiar.

I can remember contacting a local mainstream holiday club when Taz was about 5, her sister was already booked to attend. I explained Taz’s level of need and what she’d need to have in place to access it (essentially a 1:1). They explained that this would mean that the £145 a week club would cost £445 a week. They seemed to think this would put me off and that we’d perhaps just drift away. I discussed this with my social care contact at our local authority who agreed to the provision within our direct payments package. I then emailed the club to say we’d secured funding and could they give me details so could let the LA know. They did not reply. I chased, got a brief reply asking for more details of her needs which I duly sent. They never replied. I knew we were too much trouble for them. I know this to be discrimination and perhaps if I’d chased and pushed, they’d have eventually made it happen. But by that time, I’d got the message. I would never put someone as wonderful as Taz somewhere where she was not wanted. They did not deserve the privilege of spending time with her.

The summer after this happened, Taz had settled in at her special school and I received a letter home inviting her to be part of the summer club that a charity run at the school for the first three weeks of the summer holidays. The cost? £45 a day. This charity was The Hollow Lane Club. This awesome little charity is funded by some brilliant supporters, meaning the club is heavily subsidised.

I was unsure at first. The club runs at the school site and part of me felt guilty for sending Taz back to ‘school’. I booked her in, nervous and not knowing what to expect. We had no choice, like many families with disabled children, we simply could not cope alone over the holiday. When the timetable of activities came home for that first summer club, I cried. I could not believe what I was reading. This wasn’t a typical summer club where I may have expected a bit of messy play and few crafts. There were trips to the zoo, the circus, trips to a trampoline park, artists coming in, theatre companies coming to stage puppet shows, T shirt tie dying, a water party, bouncy castle, the list goes on, and on. A million times better than that mainstream club that rejected us. Each summer the activities are wonderfully inventive and hugely ambitious. There’s a clear desire to excel for our children. As a parent of a severely disabled child, the feeling of knowing that there are a team of people thinking up the best summer club ever, especially for children like yours, is indescribable. What I can tell you is that it makes me well up every time I think about it.

The club was set up 20 years ago and the same manager runs it today. They don’t stop at summer clubs, they do a Saturday club, an after school club and a siblings group. I have recently had the privilege of becoming a Trustee of the club meaning I can see the inner workings. The energy and ambition that the team has astounds me. And it’s all for our children. That is a profoundly uplifting thought. The world, despite some valiant efforts in small pockets, is not the friendliest place for children like Taz. So, the team at the club have created a world that is, and then some. Meanwhile, we, and many other families like us, get the respite we so desperately need.

Life-changing is a phrase that gets bandied about all over the place; but if I try to think about our lives without the beacon of the Saturday club and summer club, I stop myself. I genuinely do not know how we could manage without it.

This post is dedicated to the team at the club; in particular the core staff team whose drive and ambition is an inspiration. Thank you.

Read about how much we raised for the Hollow Lane Club here

Our fundraising page is open here.

This week I have been lucky enough to be welcomed into the One Voice Media team as an intern. I have spent the last five days getting involved in a range of projects and spending time with a mix of people in the office. With no task being the same, my week at One Voice has truly immersed me into the PR & Marketing World.
I have learnt so many things this week and have developed my skillset immensely. I think the best way to get across how wonderful this week has been is to break it down, day by day. So, let’s get straight into it…

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Working alongside Princesshay and partners, we supported the creation of the Exeter Sustainability Awards. These were designed to recognise the achievements of local businesses, organisations and individuals contributing to resource efficiency and sustainable practice.

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There are plenty of marketing and PR courses out there, for anyone to learn from – people just like our PR and Social Media Assistant Jazz.

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