Ambassador Activity
The regional ambassador training and member events held throughout England have now all successfully passed and were enjoyed by many of you. Thank you to all of you who were able to attend, but moreover for inviting guests to these events. This month we have already recruited a further seven ambassadors, bringing the total to 104. Several of these, were in fact guests at these events wishing to learn more about the scheme, who have since converted to becoming ambassadors. This year we would like to reach 150 ambassadors, so should anymore of you know of someone who would like to become an ambassador then please direct them to the website.
Many of you who attended the training sessions swopped your contact details with other ambassadors in your local area. In the coming weeks you will be asked for written permission for me to share your contact details with other ambassadors and members in your local area. This will allow you the opportunity to meet with other ambassadors and form regional networks, for support and to share advice, ideas and contacts about how best to promote Shared Interest and increase our membership. I would like to encourage all of you to get together in the New Year to continue to drive the scheme forward.
As we approach the end of 2009, Supporter Relations Manager, Paul Sharpe would like to announce, ‘On behalf of the Supporter Relations Team, I would like to thank all of our ambassadors for their efforts as part of our team this year. We know that it is incredibly rewarding to work for an organisation that makes such a difference, but you give up your own time to support our mission to meet the needs of our partner organisations in the developing world. As we move into the New Year, our efforts have increased value as we are in both a happy and sad situation of being fully lent. This means that we are more efficient than ever at identifying the people who need our help most, and providing them with appropriate finance and support. However, it also means that we are unable to lend to others who rely on us as we do not have the additional share capital that this requires. If we all remember that each time we promote Shared Interest we are taking another step on the road of increasing our resources and therefore the number of people who we can extend our services to, then it makes it incredibly worthwhile.’
The run up to the festive season has not slowed down your efforts this past month. Here is a brief summary of what some of you have been engaged with:
Ralph Eales in Derby and Chetan Bhatt in Buckinghamshire have recently been in contact with two members, who had approached me regarding opportunities for ambassadors to speak in their local areas. This demonstrates the importance of being able to share contact details with members, as we can therefore satisfy the demand from members regarding opportunities to increase our investment.
Since attending the Bristol training session, Lynda Whish has made contact with her local fair trade coordinator at Exeter City Council. Following this contact, Lynda is working with our PR Manager, Stina, to write a piece about Shared Interest and her role as an ambassador, to add to the new Exeter City Council directory.
Margaret Vernon promoted Shared Interest at a stall in the Green Market marquee in York. She also distributed our leaflets at the weekly fair trade café in Dunnington.
You have been continuing to promote us by distributing our postcards and you will be pleased to know that we are having a good response with regards to enquirers coming into the office as a result of your efforts. Susan Murphy used these at Fulwood Fair Trade Fair in Preston and also distributed them to customers at the fair trade stalls in Prescot, Merseyside. Also, Tracy Mitchell distributed postcards at the Scottish Fair Trade Fair campaign day and convinced organisers at a Christmas Fair to include our postcards in the goody bags which were handed out. Should you wish to request more postcards please let me know.
Carole Press has offered many new contacts in Belfast as we are expanding and hoping to recruit new ambassadors in Northern Ireland and find new opportunities to promote Shared Interest and increase our membership there.
Edward and Judy Evans arranged to have a stall at a Fair Trade Awareness event in north Cardiff and at a Fair Trade Market in Rhydypenau. Judy comments, ‘at the Fair Trade event in north Cardiff we had quite a lot of interest, gave out a lot of leaflets and had a few people who might invest.’ They also attended the AWEMA Conference in Swansea and made contact with two Fair Trade groups in Swansea.
Mike Mckinley helped Paul and Sally at the Raising the Bar event in London. Also he gave a talk at Witney Probus Club and as a result, received a donation for the Shared Interest Foundation.
Thank you to all of you who have been active this month. You will have noticed that we have added a new feature to the Newsletter which records the amount of new members generated as a result of your activity and the number of new active ambassadors recruited this month. Please continue to provide feedback and code the literature you distribute so that your activities and their results can be shared and celebrated with both head office and other ambassadors. I hope you all have a great festive season and look forward to meeting with those of you in Scotland and Northern Ireland in the New Year and hearing from all of you about your plans for Fair Trade Fortnight.
|
Click here to learn how you can invest in fair trade. Click here to donate to the Shared Interest Foundation |
|
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Ashleigh
Thanks for the update. As you know I attended and thoroughly enjoyed the Ambassador training/member event in London back in November. We brainstormed ideas for Fairtrade Fortnight 2010 – 22 February – 7 March, particularly around the product theme, which is tea. Are you planning to circulate a list of ideas for Ambassadors to use in promoting Shared Interest during Fairtrade Fortnight?