Hair and Hounds

GIN volunteers and their dogs spent a wonderful "hair raising" day on Saturday 10th May, fundraising and awareness raising at Chetwynd Hair Design salon in Wolstanton, Staffs.

The event was organised by Marie, the owner, to celebrate the 5th anniversary of the opening of the salon.

Marie is the proud owner of a beautiful greyhound, Lulu, and she decided to celebrate by donating all the proceeds from Saturday to a greyhound charity. We were delighted that she chose GIN.

The event had been extremely well planned. Marie had even arranged for bollards and balloons to be placed outside the salon so that we could set up the tombola. All her staff were extremely enthusiastic and could not have been more helpful. They were all wearing specially printed T Shirts with a photo of Reggie (who needed a home) on the front.

Several of Marie's customers had sent donations for the tombola as well as money (£70) from those who could not be there in person. We also had a donation of a pair of hair straighteners from one of the reps, which we can use at a future event as a raffle prize.

Other customers had made beautiful cakes which were on sale with cups of coffee and tea. The Asian lady who lives next door to the salon had made a large dish of onion bhajis. Everything was absolutely delicious.

There was a wonderful atmosphere throughout the day with many people coming to see us with their dogs and joining in the fun. We even had the vicar from the nearby church having a go on the tombola!

Marie had hoped to be able to raise £500 on the day, but the final figure was £683. We were all overwhelmed by the generosity we had been shown and very grateful to Marie, her staff and customers for all their hard work. Many thanks also to our very own "Tombola Queen", Jo, who was kept busy all day selling plants and videos as well as tombola tickets.

Marie has very kindly invited us back in 5 years time to celebrate the salon's 10th Anniversary!

Sue, Phil, Carol, Jo and GIN Cheshire volunteers