Happy Christmas from KitAid

Happy Christmas from all at KitAid,  below is a list of some of our 2013 highlights!

25,400 items of kit sent all across the World in 2013 (at no expense to KitAid)

725 footballs, sets of goalposts, goal nets and 1,000+ Match Attax cards also delivered

We have now sent out 220,000 items of kit since KitAd was set up in 1998

We celebrated our 15^th Anniversary in style with 200 supporters and Graham Taylor OBE

We were featured on Sky Sports News in August and also interviewed on BBC Radio 5 Live

We featured in many different newspapers across the UK as well as some African media

We sponsored the brilliant Ballysillan YFC football camp again as well as projects in Lesotho, Uganda and the Gambia

We were the chosen charity partner for the Hertfordshire FA, Evo-stik Northern Premier League and Spartan South Midlands League

We have strengthened our relationship with the University of Herts and Middlesex University

We have continued to receive fantastic support from PUMA and other manufacturers such as Great Branding

We would like to thank our Patron Graham Taylor OBE and all of the clubs from the entire football pyramid who have donated so much kit in 2013.

Happy Christmas from the KitAid team

FC Cornerstone visit Zimbabwe

FC Cornerstone recently visited Zimbabwe and whilst they were on their trip they donated a number of kits to various different destinations.  The majority of the kit was donated to the Kadoma Youth football academy as well as 2 schools in the township of Rimuka.

The kit in demand was that of Liverpool FC, these were shared between the Tariro childrens home  and the Moses Chunga academy.  Whilst the kit of FC United of Manchester found a new home with the Moses Chunga academy as well.  A home was even found for a signed Norway ladies international shirt for a female football enthusiast.  Below is some pictures of the trip and the happy new owners of some top class kit.

Charlie's gift

Good luck to Jason Fidler who will tomorrow and Friday be taking on the challenging task of cycling from Hemel Hempstead to Birmingham.

All proceeds from this goes to a brilliant charity Charlie's gift, if you would like to sponsor Jason please see the following link.

https://mydonate.bt.com/events/charliesheroes/107730 

Good luck from everyone at KitAid Jason in braving the arctic conditions and look forward to hearing all about it once completed.

New KitAid Drop Boxes

We are very grateful to Simon Wheeler from Stylographics in Watford, for designing and producing our very first KitAid drop box.

Simon heard about our work and decided to offer his help, which we are extremely grateful for.  We have always struggled to provide professional looking collection boxes and these are fantastic.  We collected the very first box yesterday and look forward to receiving a few more over the coming weeks.

Stylographics have done us proud and we recommend them for all of your business needs!!!

 

 

Four Four Jew, Football, Fans and Faith

Many thanks to the Jewish Museum London and to Mitzvah Day for including KitAid in their excellent football family fun day and exhibition on 24 November.

Over 200 people attended the exhibition in Camden and a large number of shirts were donated on the day.  This along with other Mitzvah Day collections has resulted in a bumper load of kit being donated this year.

Thanks also to Judith Vandervelde for inviting us and to Lauren Schogger for holding the fort at the KitAid stand. We look forward to continuing our partnership with Mitzvah Day next year.

 

 

 

Simon Balle school collection

Congratulations to Simon Balle school in Hertford for collecting a fantastic amount of kit and football boots from the whole school.  Students from the school sports council volunteered to give presentations to each of their year groups and set up a collection point in the school reception.  They ran the project  over a whole week and managed to fill the KitAid water butt with a great selection of kit.

 

Thanks also to Mr Stobbart, a PE teacher, who picked up on the KitAid message at a presentation given by Derrick Williams at a Herts FA Schools meeting.

Mitzvah Day,17 Nov Four Four Jew exhibition.

KitAid will be at the Four Four Jew event in Camden this weekend, feel like popping along or want to know more about it click on the following link.

http://www.allinlondon.co.uk/whats-on.php?event=118250 

KitAid anniversary dinner

If you want to be reminded what a great evening the 15th anniversary celebrations were or were unable to attend you are now able to relive the evening on YouTube.  Select the following link to see some of the highlights.

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6VYDHVXMqVc2mqNjbPAW1Q?feature=watch

KitAid 15th Anniversary - Jess Bergman

Many thanks to Jess Bergman who stole the show with her beautiful performance on the night.  Jess is a rising opera star and we are sure she will perform on the big stage and hopefully at a Cup Final some day soon.  Judge for yourself though through the following link.
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhwfksVQvx8

KitAid celebrates 15th Anniversary in style

KitAid celebrated 15 years of success with a truly memorable black tie event at the Watford Hilton hotel in the presence of Patron, Graham Taylor and 200 guests.

The event was a combination of after dinner speeches, live music, an auction and a fantastic demonstration of freestyle football from Guinness World Champion, Dan Magness.  Graham Taylor gave a brilliant speech on what KitAid means to him and he officially retired from playing football on the night by handing over his last two pairs of football boots.  One pair was later auctioned for £370 and the other pair will soon be on their way to Kampala to Stegota FC. Young opera singer Jess Bergman performed 4 beautiful songs, KitAid launched a new dvd of their project work in Lesotho, Peter Thompson spoke passionately about another project KitAid supports in his native Belfast and Derrick Williams, KitAid founder, spoke about the power of partnerships and his personal highlights.

In 15 years KitAid has sent out 205,000 items of kit to 58 different countries, and amazingly 135,000 items have been sent out within the last 5 years.  The evening was a huge success and all 200 guests had a fantastic night and can’t wait for the 20^th Anniversary in 2018!

 

 

 

New KitAid dvd - filmed in Lesotho

Here is the new KitAid release which we hope you will find interesting.  It was filmed by Edward Morgan, a specialist in African projects who has worked in Lesotho.

The official premiere of the dvd was at the 15^th Anniversary celebration dinner, held on 17 October, in the presence of KitAid Patron, Graham Taylor and 200 supporters.

We hope you enjoy the dvd as much as we all did, see http://youtu.be/YvKz4JjDUoA

Derby County FC - What happened next?

KitAid's Derrick Williams was recently invited to a half time presentation at Derby County FC.  All was going well but could this appear on a future Question of sport episode? What happened next?  Please see the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIBm48nFlRg&feature=youtube_gdata

From Hatfield to Macedonia (by Boriscar)

Congratulations to Gary Thomas from Affinity Water, who recently completed a marathon drive from Hatfield to Skopje, Macedonia, delivering kit to orphanages en route.

 

Gary was part of the fantastic Gol! Charity event where Wales supporters buy a cheap car as part of their challenge to get to away games in Eastern Europe.  Gary bought “Boris”, an old Mondeo Estate and amazingly made it to Skopje without breaking down and even hitting 120mph on the Autobahn!  Kit and footballs were handed out to various orphanages which were very well received.

 

Well done Gary, a real shame that Wales lost the game to a late goal from Macedonia.

 

 

Reading FC - KitAid

Recently KitAid were invited to Reading FC to collect unwanted kit they were donating.  It was great to see a club of Reading's size getting involved and the day was filmed by Sky Sports, please see the link below for the clip.

Everyone at KitAid wishes Reading FC the best for the forthcoming season and their push for promotion back to the Premiership. 

http://www1.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/teams/reading/8850059/92-live-reading

Watford FC Open Day

Many thanks to WFC and to Alex Ashby for inviting us to have a stand at this season’s open day event.  We had a prime position next to the players tent and we also received a lot of kit and Watford shirts.

We also met some of the players and even had a new Brazilian taking refuge in our gazebo to take a break from the constant autograph signing!  We also met our new mascot, a West Highland Terrier kitted out in a doggie Hornets kit.  Perhaps we should start sending out kit for canines next!

Thanks again to WFC and we really hope you make it to the Premier League next season.

Hurry before all 200 tickets sell out

Tickets for our 15th Anniversary Celebration Dinner on 17 October are selling fast, so hurry if you want to join us at the Watford Hilton.

We have a great night planned and Graham Taylor will be joining us as the main guest speaker. As well as a champagne reception, 3 course dinner with wine, we will also have live music, an auction with some great sports related items and a raffle. We are really looking forward to a great night with our supporters from all around the UK.

To order your tickets (£37.50 each or £350 for a table of 10) please see our web site for details, www.kitaid.net or send your order in to KitAid (FAO Lauren Schogger), Tamblin Way, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9EZ. Cheques should be made payable to KitAid.

Football kit dress down day

KitAid would like to say a massive thank you to Bengeo Primary School near Hertford for a fantastic donation of kit and £424 which they collected via a footy kit dress down day. In particular, our thanks go to Dominic Bannon who came up with the idea of running the project and approached his head teacher to ask permission. He also included his friend Jack Smith (currently playing for Luton Town Academy) to help him.

Derrick Williams attended a cheque presentation at the school and spoke to all of the pupils about KitAid. The school has now decided to make this an annual project which is great news.

Thank you Dominic, Jack and all at Bengeo Primary School.

Herts FA Awards

KitAid attended the Herts FA awards dinner last night and would like to congratulate KitAid supporter Kenny Lawrence for his award.  Kenny regularly helps KitAid by helping promote, move and collect kit and also does a lot of work with Hemel Aces football club. 

Kenny picked up volunteer of the year award for the Eastern counties region and is now in contention for the national volunteer of the year.  Thank you Kenny for your continued support of KitAid.

Copperbelt girls team

Womens football is beginning to gain momentum in Zambia and recently at KitAid we were sent a picture of the Copperbelt girls team, the latest recipient of kit.  We wish the girls well with any forthcoming fixtures.

We only sing when we're fishing!

A big thank you to The Affinity Water Angling Club for raising an amazing £300 for KitAid earlier this month. 18 anglers took part in the two day event at Inns Lake in Rickmansworth.

The biggest catch of the weekend was a 35lb 4oz Common Carp and the overall winner was Dean Betts with a total catch of 75lb. The money raised will help us support children across Africa with their dream of receiving football kit.

Please see below,one of the catches of the weekend as well as Joe Ellis handing over the cheque to Derrick Williams & Sean McGuigan.

Spartans South Midlands League

KitAid are very happy to announce a partnership with The Spartans South Midlands League for the forth coming season 2013/14. 

KitAid will be promoted across all leagues and we look forward to receiving kit and working with all the clubs involved.  Good luck to the paricipating teams for the new season ahead.

Ricky Road Run

We are very grateful to the Ricky Road Run Committee for donating £1,368 to KitAid from the proceeds of the 2012 10 mile run.

If you would like to take part, either as a runner or helper in the 2013 event please visit their website at www.rickyroadrun.co.uk

KitAid will also be one of the benficiaries from this year's run, so please do get involved if you can.

 

AON

Many thanks to the team of volunteers from AON in Hemel Hempstead who attended our May boxing up session. The team was led by Karen Colley as part of a charitable giving project by AON.

They helped us pack 71 boxes which were handed over to charities who will now deliver the kit to the Gambia, Nepal, Zimbabwe and Burkina Faso. A great mornings work and we look forward to seeing Karen and her team at a future boxing up.

KitAid Annual Review

The KitAid annual review 2012/2013 is now HERE - check out all the great stuff we have been doing over the past 12 months.

FC United Of Manchester kit collection

Last Saturday saw FC United Of Manchester hold a kit amnesty. 

It was another great collection and we are really grateful for the ongoing support given by Ambassador Club, FC United. This is the 4th collection we have held at a game and each time we come away with more kit. It is also great that we are now receiving FC United replica shirts and we will be forming a squads worth of their kit to meet a request from Naivasha Polytechnic in Kenya.

We would like to thank the club and their fans, as well as Peter for helping organise the event and Kenny and Rob for providing transportation of kit. Everyone at KitAid wishes the club well in their end of season push for promotion.

FC United Amnesty Day

We are really looking forward to visiting FC United of Manchester on Sat 20 April for the 4th KitAid Amnesty day at their game against Worksop Town FC at Gigg Lane, Bury.

FC United games are always a great experience and their fans have been very supportive of KitAid ever since they were formed. They became an Ambassador Club last year and we wish them every success with their quest for promotion to the Conference North.

If you are in the North West and looking for a game on 20 April then do come along to Gigg Lane and meet the KitAid team.

Radio 5 Live

KitAid hit the national airwaves as Derrick Williams was interviewed on BBC Radio 5 Live on the Non League Show. The interview was based around the Easter kit amnesty being held by the Evo-stik Northern Premier League on 30 March/1April. it was a great opportunity to get the KitAid name national awareness and we are looking forward to a bumper collection this year.

If you would like to hear the interview it is available on BBC I-Player at www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/nonleague Choose episode 32 and fast forward to 30 mins 18 seconds!

Evo-Stik Northern Premier League

The Evo-Stik Northern Premier League has appointed KitAid as its offical charity partner for the season 2013/14.  The league are encouraging all participating teams to collect kit on matchdays.  From everyone at KitAid its great to have the Evo Stik Northern Premier League on board and good luck to all the teams for the remainder of this season.

Bumula - Western Kenya

We always appreciate feedback at KitAid and we recently received some that shows just how powerful football and KitAid can be.

Over the last 2 years kit has been provided to 32 schools in the county of Bumula in Western Kenya.  Schools are now able to compete against each other where as before in the past one team would go topless, this is all made possible from the kind donations KitAid receives.  We have been told the impact of football has been felt across the whole county and there has been a drop in antisocial behaviour.

Now the schools are able to compete against each other, 2 students have also been admitted into specialist sports schools with free education bursaries.  Everyone at KitAid would like to wish all schools competing against each other in Bumula all the best for the forthcoming season.

Tunyai Secondary School - Kenya

Middleton Rotary Club recently completed a trip to Kenya, as part of the trip they visited Tunyai secondary school.  The pupils have never been able to play football competitively as they have never had a kit to play in.  Now thanks to Curzon Ashton FC and with the help of KitAid and Middleton Rotary Club they now do.

Everyone at KitAid wishes Tunyai secondary school all the best for the season!

Hertfordshire FA

Thank you to The Hertfordshire FA who have entered into a charity partnership with KitAid.  They will be featuring the KitAid poster in all 25 of this seasons County cup finals and will ask all participating teams to kindly donate any unwanted kit.

Good luck to all teams who are competing for this years County cups.

Hemel Town Youth U11's

Thank you to Hemel Town Youth and their continued support of KitAid!  Below is a couple of pictures from their most recent fixture.

From everyone at KitAid we wish them success for the rest of the season.

Easy Fundraising

Unable to attend a boxing up session or have no kit to donate.  You can now contribute to KitAid fundraising at the click of a button. 

If you're a regular internet shopper you can now sign up to Easy Fundraising.  This website will make a small donation to KitAid for every purchase you make online on over 2000 retailers, including Amazon, Asos, John Lewis and Marks & Spencers.

All you have to do is visit the following website http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/ and register an interest in supporting KitAid.  Then everytime you make a purchase online with a retailer that Easy Fudraising supports, KitAid recieves a donation.

Thank you to St Albans City FC and Arsenal Ladies FC

KitAid would like to say a big thank you to St Albans City FC and to Ellen White from Arsenal and England ladies for their generous donation of spare training kit.

Derrick Williams collected the kit at half time in St Albans City's 1-1 draw with close rivals Hitchin on Saturday.