Help for Heroes Idea.

[Del Monty]

I am like most people, a huge supporter for Help for Heroes, having family served in the British Military I feel it only natural to support our brave Boys and Girls fighting and serving abroad and supporting those who get injured in the line of duty.

 

I have for a long time wanted to do something to raise money for the charity other then your typical running/walking as I am no spring chicken or fit fiddle, but perhaps instead something more unique like an ... wait for it .....

 

AIRSOFTATHON !!!!!

 

In other words, getting as many people as possible on a large site somewhere in the UK and having a huge airsoft skirmish ... OR ..... playing a continued 72-100 marathon hour game somewhere. Now I have spoken to Help for Heroes directly about the idea and they have given it a thumbs up and have allowed me to register a charity event from January - December 2014, giving me plenty of time to gather support and draw up any ideas and prepare an event.

 

I was curious to know if anyone would be interested in doing this, for an obvious special cause. Help for Heroes are keen to allow this to happen and I have given all the details of Airsoft to them so that they can understand the planned idea, and also I had worried about the nature of the sport given the charity it was to raise money for, but rest assured it has been given the OK, and I would love to be able to plan something out this coming year in honor of those who have given us our freedom and protected us in hours of troubled time.

 

What do you all think ?

 

Del Monty

[jay83]

I had a similar idea on here a while back and everyone seemed to think its a good idea. I was told though that Help for Heros the money does not actually get to them and that a PTS charity was better, dont know if thats true though so dont quote that as me saying that. We would support you though, not sure about 100 hours though id get bored as hell but a Airsoft fun day where all money raised goes to the charity id be up for.

[Del Monty]

Yeah, it was really just a brainstorm idea on the concept of the event, I am leaning more towards having a huge group of people play for a day rather then a marathon event, it would be more practical and easier to manage, it was however an idea . something ... different and unique. I am open to ideas on this so if anyone has any input, it is greatly welcomed.

[jay83]

well just the fact that your thinking this is a touch of class mate

[Moose87]

yer theres alot of questions about HfH. like the directors paying themselves large wages out of the donations. my fav organisation is the Royal British Legion. they do so much for serving and ex soldiers but you never hear about it. the poppy appeal is a small corner of the organisation. look in to them guys.

[Big Joe]

It's a brilliant idea.

[CES_williamson]

im up for it! defiantly will sign up and i will bring a few mates

[Del Monty]

yer theres alot of questions about HfH. like the directors paying themselves large wages out of the donations. my fav organisation is the Royal British Legion. they do so much for serving and ex soldiers but you never hear about it. the poppy appeal is a small corner of the organisation. look in to them guys.

 

Well I am not against perhaps splitting the money between the two charities .. I am a huge supporter of the Legion and the Poppy Appeal, and you are right about the lack of coverage and work they do.

 

I know this is going to be a lot of work and something not everyone will be interested in, but if people spared 50p of there money it would be better then nothing and would give something back to those who have given so much for us.

 

I will spend the next few weeks planning ideas and coming up with something, If anybody would like to help, you are more then welcome.. I could go so far as to create a facebook group or something dedicated to airsofters supporting charities, but I wont get too far ahead of myself just yet. This really at the moment is just to see if people would be interested in a sponsered day or special gaming event somewhere.

[Spatch]

An honourable idea sir, but while you're doing your research etc, as said above, check out the charity itself, there are plenty of reasons to support help for heroes but it isn't a true forces charity, I'm sure a lot of the other ex service personnel will agree that the forces benevolent fund is also a great place to put the money and does put all the money into the charity itself, myself (ex forces) and a friend (current serving) are also looking into doing something similar for this charity next year, we have found that sourcing the right venue in the right location is the biggest problem as we are trying to get access to one of the battle grounds for a more fun Muslim type event but are still trying to secure somewhere after 3 months of various discussions

 

Good luck and we will definitely be up for bringing a few as it's a worthy cause

[Fumps]

I know this may sound like an odd ball idea but if you are doing an all night event. maybe look into doing the event in a large empty warehouse. there are loads about, they have lighting & it being indoors will prevent any weather issues.

 

just a rough idea.

[Del Monty]

Thanks guys, this has been very enlightening for me, and the support so far has been fantastic, not something I expected so quickly.

 

While brainstorming late last night, I was thinking perhaps an (good) idea is to maybe create a group for those who wish to support military charities through the mean of Airsoft, I was thinking of calling it Airsoft For Heroes .. (late night thinking!) or something similar which would be easy to use, the idea being we could gather supporters of people willing to help show support and raise awareness, support and funds for the various military charities and run different events through the course of a year such as a marathon skirmish, sponsored events, perhaps clay pigeon shooting, milsim events and the like etc. I was thinking it may be easier to something this way rather then trying to juggle several things at once and getting nowhere. I could even get wrist bands and the usual tools needed to help us to raise the support that the charities dont always get in terms of awareness, dedicated commitment and funds to help wounded soldiers and there families.

 

This could potentially be a big thing .. but I am trying to come up with something unique and different that people could be proud of and want to support rather then be forced to.

[trinityadam]

while i support the idea and would look to help attend you really do need a suitable locations.

think about the distance people will travel will vary as well car/bus/rail.

if doing a event the location has to be capable of supporting the numbers required/anticipated ,

if doing a 24 hour/weekend style game you need rest/sleep location,toilets, a safe zone, tea/coffee cooking/food. battery charging and parking all covered off as well as the normal costs the site has to manage i.e public liability insurance marshals.never mind teams and objectives

cost of the event has to be realistic as well for players even if a chunk is going to charity i.e £20-30 walk on for a day.

I set up a charity airsoft game at work, the amount that actual has gone to charity was fair for 35 players hiring kit on an established site with a emergency service reduction in price and themed objectives.hopefully you manage to find something similar.

if you want some help or a chat drop me a pm

 

 

Adam

[Del Monty]

Thanks Trinityadam, most of that mentioned has been taken into consideration for future planning, the quest at the moment is to see whether enough interest in this would allow me to start something, as I mentioned before there is pretty much an endless amount things that could be done in terms of events not just directly airsoft related, I am going to probably set up a facebook group or something soon and see about registering a charity/association name to keep everything legal and above board,also giving me a foundation to work from, as I want to do more then just a 1 event thing, thats the plan and hope anyways.

[cableguy95]

You could do something like the supports scheme that the forum has where you pay X amount for a pack where you get items of advertising like a Velcro patch, wristband etc. to show support and any money over the cost goes straight to the charity. For example the pack costs £10, the bits you get with it costed £5 to make therefore the remaining £5 would go to the charity.

 

Just an idea but would be willing to participate if it gets off the ground, good luck

[Russe11]

If you google companies that hire out RIF's for film work, they seem to have a limited range of weapons available. What if you provided a service to these companies to borrow our spare guns to benefit a good cause? That way they could offer a bigger range of weapons and we raise a bit of money for a good cause. We may even end up owning one of the stars of the silver screen

You would need to make sure that someone is liable for any loss/damage and you would need to ask for a section of the forums to ask for specific guns etc.

[Del Monty]

Excellent Ideas, would take a lot of effort and trust for the RIF film idea, but I'm thrilled with the level of ideas. I am just heading off to work currently, but when I am back I will start to draw out these ideas and hopefully come up with something exciting and workable. I have spoken to Devastator about a forum sticky thread for this so we can expand upon this, I may also create something like a face book group or page to help to, so if anyone has a idea for a name we could use .. I was thinking of something like Airsoft For Heroes, or Airsoft Heroes Association or something along those lines .. I'm always struggling for name creation.

[Ian_Gere]

I'd love to do a marathon game. TBH, if the venue is somewhere that takes longer than 2hrs public transport to get to from Nottingham, I'd only do it for a 2 day event minimum; otherwise it's a donation only from me.

 

Happy to chuck a deposit down to help secure a venue - happy to marshal / player-marshal some of the event - happy to help out with admin before &/or after.

 

Charities wise, I haven't a clue really, but if it's true that HfH bosses are paying themselves corporate stylee salaries, fuck 'em. The Legion have been at it for yonks so I expect that if there was anything dodgy about their efforts we'd have heard about it by now and they for certain have the experience to do something worthwhile with our money.

[Moose87]

yer army benevolent fund is a good one to, sounds shit but i still have one of those wrist bands on and i have been wearing it everyday for about 3 years!! woop, some how no one in the military either cared or noticed! i know its a charity band but combine that with the festivals bands and the other bands my misses made me, they are quite obvious.

[Del Monty]

It would appear that HfH is rapidily loosing appeal to me after many warnings of them, so it would be now spilt between the Royal British Legion (Poppy Appeal) and Army Benevolent Fund, I am in the process of creating a group name for the supporters willing to help me with this, a Facebook Page will also be set up over the weekend for those interested and perhaps set up support, I also have quotes for wrist bands to be made and patches, now I have an idea for a logo/emblem for the group. Exciting plans are afoot, so its a fantastic start.

[Russe11]

To be fair, if a charity pays to have better management then it is better able to achieve what it needs to do.

[Ian_Gere]

There's management and piss taking though, eh? The whole 'if you don't pay top salaries you don't get top people' argument only holds water so far... Look at bankers for a classic example of top salaries for incompetant idiots simply because that was the

[Ian_Gere]

...culture (i'm on my phone).

 

I wonder if wristbands & patches are really necessary? Do we need something to show we did give to a charity, or would we rather more of the money we gave was pure profit on the event and went directly to the charities?

[Moose87]

people should want to work for a charity because it helps people, not because it makes them alot of money. it was reported that the directors are getting 100k+ for H4H. thats alot of money, like 4 times what a soldier gets. the money could be better spent is what people are getting at.

[Del Monty]

The idea of the patches and bands was to show support of these charities through airsofters. which is a huge growing sport in the UK, my idea is to expand on this 1 day sponsored event for the charities and turn it into something quite big (if possible) with additional events, throughout the year (again if possible), really make a difference to those involved with the charities, show support through Airsoft. thats the idea/plan anyways, it may not go that way ... but it would be lovely to at least try.

[Ian_Gere]

Yeah, I can see the point in that. People may see a patch and ask about it. Can't say I've ever asked anyone what their charity wristbands were for though. I mean they're not like friendship braids or other handmade wristwear/bracelets where there's likely to be a personal story involved.