Community Amateur Sports Club Embraces Cashless Fundraising
We caught up with Gareth Wilkinson, Development Volunteer at Leamington Rugby Club, a Community Amateur Sports Club (CASC), to find out how the club is using Give A Little to collect cashless donations and why it is so important for the community to support the club’s fundraising campaigns.
September 27, 2022Gareth explains: “Sports participation has really deteriorated among young people, especially since the pandemic, so we are very focused on doing everything we can to bring them back to sports and doing real things. It’s good for their mental and physical health and this is the overall driver and philosophy of our club. We also focus a lot of our efforts on recruiting youngsters from state schools locally as pupils often have less access to sports like rugby in comparison to those at private schools.”
On how important it is for clubs like Leamington Rugby Club to raise funds, Gareth adds: “People often don’t realise how much the club relies on volunteers and the committee to get things done including raising cash for important projects such as sorting out training lights on the pitch. This kind of project requires raising funds of around £60k, which is a significant hill to climb for a community club. To help with this, the committee recruited me to their first development role and it’s part of my job to think about how we can raise money for projects like this. That’s where Give A Little comes in. Since Covid, everything has moved to contactless payments. Our bar at the club is now completely cashless and Give A Little enables us to collect contactless donations, claim Gift Aid and get in-depth reports including a dedicated report to help with our claim to HMRC.”
Gareth is using Give A Little’s DIY approach to collect cashless donations with an Android tablet, the Give A Little App and a SumUp card reader: “I have put the donation point by the till at the bar and we are suggesting that visitors pay for a beer for the club when they buy a round. Although we’re pleased with the amount we’ve raised in our first two months (£1200), we’re in the early stages of using the kit and I’m looking forward to implementing a more engaging fundraising campaign using images and video of the local community members enjoying rugby and the club. I think that will help the community understand what we are doing and why we need to raise funds and ultimately, I think it will help us raise more.”
be open to the whole community
be organised on an amateur basis
have as its main purpose the provision of facilities for, and the promotion of participation in, one or more eligible sports
not exceed the income limit
meet the management condition
meet the location condition
For more information about CASCs, visit the