a record-breaking Open day

What an amazing Open Day we had raising money for Berkshire Youth! 

After holding our annual charity Open Day, on Sunday 29 June, we can reveal that we smashed last year’s record-breaking total – a whopping £12,868! This beats last year's total which was also over £12,000. 

The day was opened by the The Mayor of Reading, Cllr Alice Mpofu-Coles, who cut the ribbon to start the day and joyfully welcomed the very long queue of waiting guests with high-fives as they entered. Several local Councillors attended as did local MP Matt Rodda. 

In spite of temperatures soaring to over 30 degrees C, hundreds of visitors piled through the gates to take part in behind-the-scenes tours, rides through the bus wash, and other fun activities. It was also the first opportunity to see one of the town’s forthcoming electric buses, adorned with the climate stripes as a statement of the company’s intent to raise awareness of environmental issues and encourage bus usage.

We are absolutely delighted to beat last year’s record total. The hot weather meant that people possibly didn’t stay as long as normal, but the engagement with our stalls, food and games was incredible.

The Open Day not only featured depot tours and rides through the bus wash, but visitors could get their names on the front of a bus, wander round current and vintage buses, and sit in the drivers’ seat. There were activities such as a coconut shy and skittles, as well as lots of Reading Buses merchandise to buy. A new mocktails stall, offering alcohol-free cocktails, suggested and lead by driver Venkat was very well received and a great additional fundraiser selling over 200!

It was an amazing day with our volunteers working tirelessly in the heat to provide a great family day out for people. I would like to thank each and every one of them for their efforts. We made sure all our volunteers had access to plenty of water and sun cream, or even a mocktail!

Berkshire Youth, our Charity of the Year, to whom the money from this goes, were also in attendance with their own stall. 

We'd like to thank all our sponsors who helped make the day a success. Sponsorships from our key suppliers helped to ensure that all the money raised could go directly to charity. British bus manufacturer Alexander Dennis were title sponsor for the whole event, Bus & Coach World sponsored the barbecue, Dawson Group sponsored the volunteer raffle, Michelin provided a raffle prize, Power Fleet sponsored the face painting, Ticketer contributed towards the cakes, and Velociti contributed towards the tea and coffee. Thank you to all of them!

We were also very pleased to welcome The Barberettes choir, featuring our Commercial Manager Gemma Redson, who sang a couple of sets to entertain everybody. Former driver and proprietor of Dolphin Catering, Randolph Bancroft provided the barbecue, and the master compere was David Sheppard, who many of you will have recognised as the voice of the buses announcing the next stops.