Maidenhead United call on community to help raise £150,000 for good causes to mark its 150th anniversary

Maidenhead United FC is calling on the community to help the club raise £150,000 for good causes to mark its 150th anniversary.

The club has launched the ‘Magpies 150 Challenge’, which it hopes will capture the imagination of people of all ages in the area and raise thousands of pounds for 15 charities based in Maidenhead and Windsor.

The idea is similar in principle to the recent 2.6 challenge, which took off in the wake of the London Marathon postponement and saw thousands of people across the country raise millions of pounds for charity.

In keeping with the theme of 150, the club is calling on individuals or groups to take on a 1.5, 15, or 150-related challenge, with the club’s CEO Jon Adams preparing to walk 150 miles over the course of a week.

Through JustGiving and Virgin Money Giving pages, the club will funnel everyone’s fundraising efforts into a single pot, which will be split equally between the charities and organisations, which include Maidenhead Foodshare, The Dash Charity and Citizens Advice.

Jon said: “All of the charities have said fundraising is a real issue at the moment. Others have had to close down and that’s causing them massive problems.

“These are charities people will be familiar with and we’re trying to put a magnifying glass on them, rather than on the national charity agenda.

“The idea is to try and build on the spirit of giving which has come about during the pandemic and the focus on the need to support local charities. If we can get businesses engaged and they promote it to their staff, suddenly you can quickly raise what seems like a big amount of money in quite a short space of time.”

The 15 charities and organisations set to benefit from the initiative are Maidenhead United Community Trust, Alzheimer's Dementia Support, The Dash Charity, Family Friends, Maidenhead Foodshare, Citizens Advice, The Link Foundation, Norden Farm, Number 22, People to Places, Re:charge R&R, Smile, SportsAble, Thames Valley Adventure Playground and Windsor Foodshare.

Jane Corry, chief executive and artistic director at Norden Farm, said: “We are hugely grateful that they’ve reached out to us with this Magpies Challenge. It’s been a really hard time and we’ve calculated we’ve lost over 80 per cent of our income, which is pretty hard.

“It costs around £750,000 a year to run Norden Farm and we get about £130,000 in funding, but all the rest is earned.

“There’s a lot of love in Maidenhead for Norden Farm and we’ve got to find ways to stay alive and the Magpies Challenge is something that’s going to help us.”

The club has launched a website for the challenge, www.magpies150challenge.co.uk, and will look to promote it through its social media platforms.

Jon also hopes that players and local celebrities will take on their own challenges. Businesses are also being asked to partner with the club to help maximise the fundraising effort.

For more information email Helen Park at helen@maidenheadunitedfc.org