Mon 24th August

Get involved. Help us share the news.

2 weeks to go till the launch of our crowdfunding appeal & I’m feeling nervous. Have we managed to attract your attention? Are we getting you on board? It’s all so nebulous I’ve got butterflies – that reminds me of the story of the storm butterfly which just by  fluttering its wings can influence the formation of a hurricane several weeks later (chaos theory). Did you know there is a social media tool called Thunderclap, that if you can raise 500 followers you can use thunderclap to repost all Twitter& Facebook posts to spread the news? So this campaign starts with each one of you in your small corner – and we are asking you to help us spread the word about the Atholl Centre and this crowdfunding campaign. Can you help?

So why do we want you all engaged? Because that’s what crowdfunding is about – drawing a crowd. And what do we want you to be excited about? The new conference room we really want to build this year. And we’re so nearly there – this is the last push!
Here it is:

So what’s so exciting about a conference room?                                                Well, for a start it’s the last piece in the jigsaw for making the whole of our ground floor into a fully accessible holiday & conference complex with meeting rooms, a place to eat, en-suite bedrooms and even a fully accessible apartment. We’ve achieved so much over the last couple of years. This would make our ground floor complete. Those of you who have stayed here in the past will know how important it is to us, and to you, to offer equality of access to all the groups who use us.

But for the locals who use the Atholl Centre as a community venue it’s just as exciting because such a high percentage of folks here in Pitlochry are retired (25%) or have a disability or chronic illness (22%), so mobility problems are widespread & the current conference room upstairs has been largely useless for them. This new room will not only be easy to get in to (and out of), it will also have built in AV & loop meaning that the significant number of hearing aid users will be able to join in properly to whatever is going on, and when they meet for U3A or WA lunch club for example even videos & presentations will be accessible because the loop will be fully connected to the AV.

Thirdly, this new room will help to make the Atholl Centre more sustainable. How? First it will save us money because having our accessible conference room on the ground floor will mean no future lift costs – either to maintain the lift (~6K per year) or to buy a new one. Second it will make us money. We intend to open up a new income stream in commercial day conferences so we can earn money with this room when the community and residential groups are not using it to balance out the discounts we give to vulnerable & community users, meaning we will no longer have to rely on donations to keep us going.

Now do you see why it’s exciting? Please support us by telling your friends. Share this blog through your emails. Follow us on social media & share/retweet/repin for us.

Thank you J

   

                     Fri 7th Aug 2015

July was a combination of rest & very hard work. While the Irish Scouts had a great time on their self-catering break Iain & Anne were on holiday and Michal & Lucas our summer volunteers arrived from Poland. Immediately after that we opened for summer B&B. We’ve had a variety of guests from many countries and have had a few chances to practice our foreign languages, with quite a few guests from France & even a family from Brazil. The weather hasn’t been very welcoming, but it’s surprising how many people from hot countries like the cool & the green. We’ve also had folk in the flat and the chalet. It’s good to see the chalet come into its own as an accessible apartment and as accessible B&B. 

A recent guest commented," Our room was the best disabled room ever - you wouldn't get that even in a top hotel and the colours are gorgeous."

A couple of weeks ago we had a Free Church girls’ camp, again self-catering, so our staff  had some time off & a chance to be refreshed & ready for the next lot of B&B guests. The girls had great fun visiting the Highland Wildlife Park & Landmark amongst other things & it was lovely to hear them singing as they did their chores first thing.

Pitlochry Arts & Crafts sale is on again  in the dining room and 20% of sales go to local charities. This is a great place to do some very early Christmas shopping and a good rainy day activity! Open Monday to Saturday 10am to 4pm Sundays 2 to 6pm, on till 15 August in the dining room.

A big Thank You to everyone who gave and helped with our Thrift shop. We raised over £700 and then a further £800 arrived from the Fargher Noble trust fund. Then we got news we had been awarded £6,000 from the Rank Foundation and another £500 came in anonymously. All this will help towards the new accessible conference room we hope to build this year.

We’d like to create a new conference room downstairs by extending & dividing our current dining room with a movable soundproof partition to create 2 large rooms, each seating 60, or when the partition is opened one enormous room, ideal for very large conferences & ceilidhs. The extension will have built in AV to bring our conference facilities into the 21^st century and a loop system for the deaf which in combination with it being a ground floor room will make it as accessible as possible for all abilities. Having a completely accessible conference room will be a boon both to our residential and our community groups and we hope having up to date AV will also help us to generate more income through day conferences, making us more sustainable & enabling us to be there for those in need.

Currently we have raised £81,000 towards this project through grant funding & community fundraising. We still need a minimum of £29,000 and as well as waiting for news about a grant request for £20K we hope to raise the remainder through crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is where we reach out to people through the internet using social media like facebook, twitter etc. to publicise what we’re trying to raise money for & ask for donations. We will also be running local events to help us reach our total e.g. the Thrift shop here in July. Could you put on an event where you live to help us raise those last few thousands? We’ve a whole list of ideas if you need some inspiration…

Our big news is that we have at last recruited a social media intern to help with our crowdfunding campaign too. Thanks for your prayers. We had 7 applications and 2 people came for interview, but Michal impressed us with his creativity & video making skills & his understanding of how to get people engaged. Thanks to Michal we're now on Pinterest, Youtube and Instagram as well as Facebook and Twitter, making the Centre much more visible online.

To keep up to date with all the developments in the conference room story you can sign up to receive this blog direct to your email using mailchimp. Just click below to take you to the sign up page.

 

   Fri 26th June 2015

Thank you for all your support. The Open Days were a great success. Over 60 people came for the Open Day on the 6^th July where we were celebrating our new accessible accommodation. Deputy First Minister John Swinney  made a really encouraging speech:

He said, “The key ingredients to success are absolute tenacity & determination, which Iain & Anne have shown. The Atholl Centre is not just fulfilling its potential in its locality but reaching out to people from other localities, surprise guests & to people in need, which is at the core of the Christian mission, and what this Centre does is make sure that whatever happens to us in our lives, we’re all able to come through the doors here & fulfil our capabilities, both for individual & collective benefit, which is something profoundly important.”                             

He came with his disabled wife Elizabeth & their young son. Local Councillor Kate Howie commented ““It was truly a lovely afternoon & felt like having your extended family round.”

We did get a Centre video done in the end, just in time for the Open Day & left it running on loop in the TV room for people to take in on their tours of the building, while Fiona Johnstone from PKAVS encouraged people to fill in community surveys. Thanks to Peter from the Media Trust  who answered our last minute pleas for help with editing with great grace & skilfully selected 5 minutes worth from an extensive file of material. 

On the 7^th we had our Eden Project Big Lunch. Although after a wild & wet week the sun had actually deigned to shine, our gazebos had been totally destroyed by high winds overnight, so we ate inside and then visited the garden. The brilliant thing about Bring & Share is that everybody brings what they can and you end up with a feast. Mildred commented “ I really enjoyed a meal I didn't have to cook" and June said “ I had a lovely time “ Leila who runs Herbal workshops here gave us some new plants from her garden and Alastair showed off the new space which he & David C. & Timo have worked so hard to complete. It’s now ready for use folks!

Clara, our French Intern, who has been with us for 6 weeks left today.  “I am really glad to have met people too generous, kind & funny like you” she wrote in her thank you letter. “ I hope for you the sun will come in Scotland” A big thank you to Rosetta for offering her a bedroom with a cat & to the Stewarts for making her part of their family during her stay. Michael from Poland is back this summer and he’s bringing his friend Lucas to work here too (arriving next week) so we’re all set for summer B&B which starts just after the Irish Scouts  leave on the 6th July. Last year we had guests from over 30 different countries.

We continue to welcome day groups and community groups throughout the summer. Please pray as they offer support to vulnerable members of our community.

Being part of the Pitlochry Art Walk has increased the number of visitors to the Rotary Young Artist display and Arbroath Town Mission Lunch club enjoyed the colourful & imaginative display during their stay too.

The Community Portable Loop which we've been asked to buy and look after so it can be lent out finally arrived. It's been a bit of a saga as the first one we sent away for turned out to have no loudspeakers, so if folk were in a public meeting it still wouldn't be much use as lots of people still would have difficulty hearing, so we sent away for a different one. This one is designed for small conference rooms so it does have a mike & speakers as well as a loop. Now we have to work out how best to lend it out as it's quite complicated to set up and didn't come with a carry case.

We’re still working on securing a Social Media Intern for the summer to help us with a crowdfunding campaign to hopefully complete the funding for the new accessible conference room we’d like to build downstairs. We held one set of interviews but the stand out candidate had to decline due to last minute family reasons so we're holding another set  in a couple of weeks. Please pray we get the right person.

We’re also running a pop–up charity shop to help us continue to upgrade the Centre for disabled people with this new room. This is from the 11^th -17^th July (Excluding Sunday 12^th). As usual we welcome donations of bric–a-brac, toys, books etc and invite you to come & see if there’s anything you’d like to buy.

Our next newsletter is just coming out. Please pick up a copy at reception or coming soon on our website.

Friday 22nd May 2015

Preparations for the Open Day (Sat 6^th June) have been intense. We’re trying to put a short video together to be shown on the day so please pray it turns out all right. The open day is to officially open our new accessible facilities completed this year (to be opened by our local MSP and Deputy First Minister, John Swinney), and to thank you for your generosity and give you a chance to be nosey and take a look for yourselves. As it starts with a buffet lunch please get your name on the list if you’re coming so we have numbers for the lunch. The BU retired ministers had a sneaky peek when they came for their annual day trip & we were so pleased when  Rev Watson Moyes, the Centre's founder, saw our improvements for the first time & thought they were wonderful.

We’re also having a Big Lunch (Eden Project scheme) on Sun 7^th June to launch the community garden. You’re very welcome at either or both events for this big celebration of what God has done & is doing through us, but do let us know if you’re coming. Any volunteers to bring food to share at the garden lunch?

Alastair’s been working hard in the garden & we’ve been asking volunteers to help to get the work done. There’s still work to do, so please let us know if you can help. If you have plants to donate from your own garden please tell us too. This way we make our budget go further and you share in making the community garden. Eric nominated us for the Asda bags community scheme and we’ve been shortlisted, so please vote for us at the Perth store (every customer can get a green token in store to put in the box & then they’re all weighed to find the winner).

Anne has been busy publicising the Centre at stalls in Perth supporting Self Directed Support – at the end of April, end of May & coming up in mid June, so this is helping us become more widely known to new groups and this month we had another minority ethnic disabled folks & carers (MECOPP) group in for a short break and they’re really impressed. Looks like they’ll be regulars in the future, and as they’re an umbrella group this could mean quite a few more midweek groups each year which is brilliant news. Another new disabled group -  international athletes - is due later this year, but their leaders arrive today to check the Centre out & hopefully give their approval. 

Children with heart disorders were also here this month for their annual break. Check out their photos on our facebook. They had great fun in spite of the rain :) Another faithful group the See Hear conference for the deaf also enjoyed their weekend & it was sunny that week! Etape was here too. They're a regular feature now. The motor marshalls stay here so they can be up first thing on Sunday morning to make sure the course is still safe and to guide the cyclists & help out if there are problems, the course management and safety HQ is upstairs in the conference room and the dining room is full of tables for sports massage. Again it was raining but thankfully not as heavily as the forecast had predicted so the race went ahead without major problems, although the cyclists had to watch their speed on the wet roads. One of the motor marshals commented " You're everything we need". Nice to be appreciated:) Pitlochry Baptist, the church next to us, which is right at the start/finish line opened their doors to Etape participants & bystanders with free cake & hot drinks during the event, which was much appreciated in the cold & the wet. Great job PBC!

Wilma is now full time looking after the office, housekeeping & being deputy for Iain when he's not around, so you'll see a lot more of her. Iain & Wilma are both learning how to work SAGE accountancy programme as we update our systems and Iain & Anne have been learning about reporting on social media. We've been awarded funding for a social media internship from Santander for 3 months. This is to help us set up a crowdfunding campaign as we try to complete the fundraising for the new conference room. If you or someone you know would be interested please get in touch. Clara arrived last Monday from Limoges in France as our new foreign intern. She'll be here for 6 weeks to improve her English & learn about managing a small business.

  

The Atholl Centre is taking part in the Pitlochry Art Walk Festival (June 20th -28th). The Centre will be one of numerous places in town with art exhibitions. We’ll also have an artist in residence, Maryann Ryves, who’ll be exhibiting landscapes done in oil at the Centre reception. Why not come & look round to admire the Rotary junior Young Artist of the Year exhibition here (starts 21st June) and give your support.