The Lady Mayoress Joins City Leaders at Mansion House for the Second City Giving Day Breakfast
The Lady Mayoress of the City of London Felicity Lyons and The Lord Mayor’s Appeal hosted City leaders and CSR professionals yesterday at Mansion House for the second annual City Giving Day breakfast. High-profile guests including Alderman Alison Gowman and Sheriff Andrew Marsden joined thought leaders from some of the City’s most prevalent companies including Gottlieb LLP, Gallagher, The Investment Association and Aon.
In her opening speech, Alderman Alison Gowman said; “City Giving Day is a huge celebration of philanthropy here in the Square Mile. Whether you’re a small business or a large corporation, the day provides a chance for you to showcase your charity partners and charitable giving, raise money, engage with employees, recruit volunteers, and have some fun!”
Now in its 10th year, City Giving Day is an annual event hosted by The Lord Mayor’s Appeal uniting the City to celebrate and promote the positive impact of philanthropy. Taking place on Tuesday 26 September 2023, it gives companies the chance to showcase their charitable and community work – collectively sharing their community outreach via the City Giving Day webpage and social media. Whether City businesses support The Lord Mayor’s Appeal, or their own chosen charities – it gives companies a platform to tell their fundraising and volunteering stories and to collaborate with other businesses within the City community.
Since its launch in 2015, City Giving Day has grown year on year with 526 companies involved in 2022. Set at the City Giving Day launch breakfast in March, the target for 2023 is to inspire organisations to get involved, not only in London but in other cities around the UK. An estimate £510,000 was raised for charities and good causes in 2022, while 64% of the organisations that took part said that City Giving Day helped to promote and celebrate their charitable activity and 72% said that City Giving Day inspired their employees to fundraise or volunteer.
Taking place at the start of the summer, the engagement breakfast is a chance for companies signed up to City Giving Day 2023 to check in on their progress and be inspired from other event ideas from hosting an office sports day to organizing a company-wide sponsored silence to putting on a bake sale. Guests were also challenged to post photos using the City Giving Day selfie frames and participate in round table discussions to encourage City businesses to collaborate.
The event also welcomes a series of guests speakers including Alderman Alison Gowman; Caroline Wright, CEO and Jan Foster, City Giving Day Project Manager at The Lord Mayor’s Appeal; Sam Sims, CEO of The Lord Mayor’s Appeal charity partner National Numeracy, Charles Fulton from fundraising experts Jumblebee, Pranathi Praveen from EY. All touched in the importance of sharing resources to maximise fundraising opportunities and shared their insights on how companies can leverage their philanthropic efforts by getting involved in City Giving Day 2023 and even how to host a City Giving Day auction.
In addition to their own fundraising activities, The Lord Mayor’s Appeal also host a number of annual City Giving Day events which companies are welcome to join. These include Tour de City, astatic Wattbike challenge where company teams of up to five people compete against each other in a thrilling 40 minute static bike race, divided into five eight-minute slots; City Walks – a one hour lunchtime walking tour taking place around the City hosted by expert City of London Guides; a Treasure Hunt inviting teams of up to eight people to solve a series of clues discovering some little known facts about the City of London; and a Quiz Nightchallenging teams of up to six to test their general knowledge and compete with the greatest minds in the City. This year, confirmed City business activities include the Music In Offices Big City Sing, The Worshipful Company of Chartered Surveyors event at Browns and The Worshipful Company of Framework Knitters ‘Knit for the Community’ initiative.
The City of London is a global leader in financial and professional services, but not everyone knows that is also invests significant sums in communities and causes to change lives and make a wider positive impact on society. Funds raised by The Lord Mayor’s Appeal on City Giving Day will be used to support the work of their three charity partners National Numeracy, MQ Mental Health Research and The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award; plus their four flagship initiatives delivering ground-breaking programmes to create A Better City for All that is Inclusive, Healthy, Skilled and Fair. Delivering an impact in the City that transforms lives through those four key pillars, The Appeal’s thought leadership initiatives Power of Inclusion, This is Me, We Can Be and City Giving Day offer learning, development and engagement opportunities for employees across the Square Mile.
To find out more or to register for City Giving Day visit: https://www.thelordmayorsappeal.org/initiatives/a-fair-city/register-and-get-involved/