It was a cracking Easter for one local charity in Wadebridge which raised over £4,300 during a fundraiser.

Concern Wadebridge at The John Betjeman Centre hosted an Easter themed afternoon cream tea with over 30 people attending for delicious cakes, sandwiches and of course jam and cream! The event helped to raise over £300 for the operations of the charity, which seeks to support older people in the community.

Concern Wadebridge supports people over 50 and/or have a disability but the centre and its facilities are open to everyone to use. It hosts daily a variety of classes and activities, and the rooms are available to hire for everything from charity events to children’s birthday parties.

Em Burt, manager of Concern Wadebridge said: “It was a lovely atmosphere. We love hosting events like this and bringing people together over some good home cooked food and a cuppa – our only downfall is that we are over feeders, so everyone went home with a box of treats to enjoy.”

In the run up to Easter, Em came up with a brainwave to email all the town’s businesses and ask if they would kindly all donate a £5 gift voucher each so that she could make one big hamper full of the vouchers for one lucky winner.

In return she would take a photo of the business giving her the voucher and post on social media – this was the start of something unbelievable.

Em said: “Within minutes an email pinged back to say they would like to donate £15 and another to say £25 – fast forward and I have now been in over 60 photos - I am a bit like where’s Wally.

“The support from not only the town but other businesses from St Columb and Polzeath has just been amazing. People I had not emailed were calling me in the street asking if they could donate to have a photo. The businesses that the nature of their work would struggle for vouchers gave us other gifts like wine and designer sunglasses!

“In the end we had about £1,200 in vouchers and about another 25 prizes. I was so overwhelmed but the positive response. Last time we hosted a big raffle we sold about 1,000 tickets so I decided I would order 1,500 this time but the response from the public was amazing – I had one person buy £100 of tickets, another £50 so I had to keep ordering more and more.”

At the time the raffle was drawn the charity had raised £3,980. Em put this on social media to say thank you to everyone and received even more donations.

She added: “I said just £20 short of £4,000 and within minutes two people donated the £20 and another person added £10 so we actually raised £4,030! Thank you to everyone – it’s just amazing!”

All the money raised helps the charity to host support groups and activities for everyone in the local community.