Helping More People Play More Tennis
Making a Difference
Charity Open Days
Current and former GB Davis Cup/Billie Jean King Cup pros will visit your club free of charge to provide a day of fun including tennis masterclasses, doubles exhibition matches and fastest serve competitions.
Over 450 clubs across the UK have already benefited from charity days provided by Bright Ideas for Tennis. All funds raised on the day will remain within the club, and we suggest are used to provide free sessions for those in the community that wouldn’t ordinarily get the chance. This in turn leads to higher local participation figures, and potentially an increase in club membership numbers. Funds may also be used to contribute towards larger capital projects such as building new courts, refurbishing clubhouses, installing floodlights or other club improvements such as providing ball machines or practice walls
About the fundraising Day
We wanted to celebrate the Club’s 20th Anniversary by offering the members something different and at the same time involving the wider tennis community. Absolutely nothing could have been better than what Danny Sapsford and Chris Eaton at Bright Ideas for Tennis brought to us in Bristol. The coaching clinics had sold out within a few days (82 players taking part) and over 150 Barbeque tickets were pre-sold in the first week so we were very excited about the upcoming event and even invited some local tennis VIP’s to join us!
How we made a difference
The added bonus, apart from raising lots of money on the day, is the number of new people playing tennis at the club. Ten new players came in the first week and that immediately doubled by week two after the event – we can’t wait to see what happens next! The publicity from the event has brought lots of enquiries and we can’t thank Bright Ideas for Tennis enough for providing us with an opportunity to offer more tennis to more people more often.
About the fundraising Day
As a reward for their successful fundraising North Dulwich received a visit from our charity ambassador, Tim Henman along with Danny Sapsford, Luke Milligan and Jamie Baker. It was a roaring success with 250 people in attendance, a memorable experience for all who attended either for coaching or to watch the doubles exhibition match, enjoy the fantastic BBQ or watch Tim Henman's 'Keepy-Uppy' challenge. The day raised over £5K, making the total raised by the club nearly £10,000, an incredible achievement for a small club.
How we made a difference
The aim of the North Dulwich Bright Ideas for Tennis day was to raise funds to upgrade the club's two shale courts to make them all-weather proof, and to provide free coaching to members of the local community.
Some of the money raised has already been spent on provision of free coaching for members and non-members of all ages at the Club’s last open day. In addition, new members who joined the Club during the open day are to receive two further free coaching sessions. The remainder of the money raised on our Davis Cup day will mainly go towards meeting the cost of resurfacing the club’s two shale courts.
Our I Play 30, programme provides free tennis activity sessions designed for adults and children with learning, sensory, mental and physical disabilities.
Bright Ideas for Tennis provide training for coaches and volunteers, a budget for specialist equipment and support clubs in delivering sessions to local SEN schools and community groups.
We currently operate I Play 30 sessions at 50 venues throughout the UK.
CAPITAL FUNDING PROJECTS
Managing a tennis facility is no easy task. There are always a million and one little maintenance jobs to be done. Club volunteers do a fantastic job keeping their clubs up and running by taking on the smaller day to day tasks, but occasionally a bigger project is necessary that requires specialist knowledge, equipment and a lot of resource. That’s where we can help, acting as the catalyst in getting the project off the ground.
Additional fundraising activities can be organised such as skydiving or an invitation to play in our annual 24hr tennis marathon. These events usually raise larger sums of money compared to our Charity Open Days, and this money can be used as leverage to raise even more funds in the form of grants. Bright Ideas for Tennis will work with the venue, using our own experienced grant writer in order to give clubs the best possible chance of success
Even though Bright Ideas for Tennis don’t directly give grants for these type of projects, we do work hand in hand with the selected clubs in a variety of ways.
The initial Open Day run by Bright Ideas and the knock-on activities have had a major effect on the club itself and our visibility in the local community. Cardio tennis sessions (8 players per week) Touchtennis tournaments (48 players) . Funds raised by Bright Ideas for Tennis were viewed ‘highly positively’ by the LTA as part of our loan application
The funds raised by Bright Ideas for Tennis were invaluable but possibly, even more importantly, their involvement in our project gave us the platform to promote tennis throughout our community. Our existing members were re-enthused, and our kids were inspired by the Davis Cup Open Day. Everyone cannot wait for next season to start. Their involvement has definitely been the catalyst that has enabled our project to succeed
Generally I feel the club has been ‘lifted’ by the introduction of the new facilities with members jockeying to get on courts 7 & 8 at all times and the coaches loving the improved surface to teach on. Our grand opening was a great success with the help of Bright Ideas for Tennis and Marcus Willis at a late time of the season and we hope to maintain that momentum into the new year and beyond.
There are lots of positives I can tell you about. The positive relationship with our partnership school is booming. Also, we are looking at the possibility of partnerships with other schools in the area to start making tennis an essential part of the Physical Education curriculum, in our area. Without Bright Ideas for Tennis, we can ask ourselves, would we have been in a position to achieve this? My answer is a resounding no
In previous years, some members of our Committee had to spend hours sweeping the courts to remove the mud before play could start. This tended to be done only for organised social and coaching sessions. Now that this is no longer needed, individuals can come down to play informally at any time without preparation and we are certainly aware of this happening on a regular basis - for example parent members and their children during the recent half term week.