100 brave participants, who spent a night under the stars, at CEO Sleepout’s recent London event collectively raised over £200,000 for the charity.
The event, which was held on November 21st at Lord’s Cricket Ground, was part of a national initiative that encourages business leaders and executives from the local area to spend a night outdoors to raise awareness and funds to combat homelessness.
The total amount raised at this year’s event was over £200,000, with an additional £15,000 in matched funding and offline donations expected. Charities, including Walking With The Wounded, Only A Pavement Away and the Change Please Foundation, which are working to change lives on the front line of homelessness will benefit from the extraordinary amount of money raised.
Chief executive of CEO Sleepout Bianca Robinson said: “This is a tremendous achievement and I am thrilled that each and every one of our participants pulled together to bat our target out of the park.
“The money raised from this year’s event means over £1 million has now been raised by business leaders in London since the first CEO Sleepout London in 2014 and this is just fantastic!”
Speaking of the local business community, Bianca said: “I believe the leadership community in this area has the power and opportunity to use their voice to shine a light on this issue and they came out in force to do this.”
While it was a bitterly cold night, the atmosphere was anything but with one participant, Wendy Addison, sharing her story of becoming homeless after whistle-blowing and how she overcame this, which Bianca described as a memorable moment from the sleepout.
The top contributors from the event include Henrik Muehle from Flemings Hotel, who raised £23,378 and Andy Hornby, the CEO of The Restaurant Group who added £12,180 to the overall total.
CEO Sleepout was founded by the elected mayor of Middlesbrough Andy Preston in 2013 after bringing Middlesbrough’s business leaders together for a night outdoors to raise funds to help people in poverty in the region.
The concept was brought to London in 2014 and the first sleepout raised £150,000.
Bianca said: “The CEO Sleepout’s success in London continues to demonstrate that London’s business leaders are caring and compassionate.
“I hope to see many of the participants from this event next year.”
From all of the events held in cities across the UK since it was established, CEO Sleepout has raised over £3.5 million. It is a lean charity, with only one full-time employee, and the vast majority of funds raised are distributed to grassroots charities changing lives on the frontline of homelessness.
