When Focus Ireland set out to engage the business community in a large scale annual campaign they went straight to some of Ireland’s most influential CEO and MD’s asking the question – ‘will you give one night to change a lifetime?’.
The charity says “we know it’s really ambitious and we’re asking the busiest people in the country to be in the same place on a night in October, so while we were hoping to get some support, we were overwhelmed by the response. That first year Google, Facebook, Vodafone, and PayPal didn’t hesitate – they wanted to support the campaign and they wanted to be there”.
The feedback was clear – business leaders wanted to give back to the community they worked in, where their staff live and work every day. ‘We see people sleeping rough on our street and we know it’s wrong – if we can help we will!’
In 2012 sixty business leaders slept out in the Iveagh Gardens and fundraised over €300K to fund Focus Ireland’s vital services.
Since then the campaign has gone from strength to strength and in 2014 the Charity added a Munster event in Cork City Gaol and in 2015 they moved the Dublin sleep-out to the more public location of Christ Church Cathedral.
The 2017 sleep-out will take place on Friday October 13th and Focus Ireland is hoping to receive more support than ever before from the FMCG sector.
To get involved and sleep-out in aid of homelessness Call JP or Aoife on 01 8815984 or register at www.focusireland.ie/get-involved/company-fundraising/shine-a-light/
Pictured: Ronan Harris, Vice President, Google, EMEA, getting a cup of warm soup before sleep-out for the night in 2016.
© 2017 - Checkout Magazine
