St Giles Hospice raises thousands through TreeCycle campaign

St Giles Hospice is celebrating after this month's TreeCycle campaign became the most successful yet, collecting even more trees than last year's record-breaking collection.

The environmentally friendly recycling campaign saw more than 5,000 Christmas trees picked up by volunteers in return for a small donation to St Giles, raising over £69,000 for the hospice. Last year 's collection picked up 4,428 trees.

All funds raised by TreeCycle help to ensure that St Giles Hospice can continue to support local people and their families living with a terminal illness.

Between the fifth and 12 January, 115 dedicated and energetic volunteers braved the freezing winter weather to join the eighth annual TreeCycle collection (following government covid guidelines).

They picked up Christmas trees from Lichfield, Walsall, Sutton Coldfield, Tamworth, Burton, Rugeley, Burntwood, Uttoxeter, Swadlincote, Stafford and surrounding areas.

Chloe Herbert, head of fundraising at St Giles Hospice, said: “This year 's TreeCycle campaign has been a huge success and we are absolutely delighted with the results. Our 2021 collection was a record-breaking event following the amazing goodwill we had from our supporters during the covid-19 pandemic, so to beat that total in 2022 is simply amazing.

“We need to raise £850,000 every month just to keep our services going, so the success of this year's TreeCycle will make a massive difference to local people and their families at a time when they need us the most. ”

Wincanton provided St Giles with vital logistics and volunteer support during the collections, and the trees will be recycled for agricultural uses at Greener Composting in Wall, Lichfield.

Chloe added: “We 'd also like to thank Lichfield Tree Works, Central England Cooperative, Darwin Electricals, Robson Lister and DHL Fradley for joining our volunteers in the TreeCycle collections this year. ”

“As always, our volunteers, community and businesses have been amazing and we couldn 't have made TreeCycle such a huge success without their dedication and support - it honestly couldn 't happen without them.

“Our volunteers tell us that they really enjoy TreeCycle and get a great sense of achievement from taking part and we hope they will encourage even more volunteers to get involved next year, so that we can collect more trees than ever.

“If you would like to volunteer at next year 's TreeCycle, or if your business can offer us their support, we 'd be very happy to hear from you. To find out more contact our Volunteer Team by email at [email protected] or call us on 01543 434533. ”

For more information about St Giles Hospice and the expert care it provides, please visit www.stgileshospice.com

Pictured (left to right): volunteers Ann and Lew Turner out on their TreeCycle round