Great Ormond Street Hospital provides inspirational and world-class care to hundreds of children every day. In order to 'keep the magic alive' over £50 million must be raised each year so that it can remain at the forefront of international paediatric medicine and continue to offer the world famous service to he thousands of patients that pass through its doors each year. The money raised each year goes towards the redevelopment of the new hospital buildings to replace the facilities that were lost as a result of the fire and also to replace the original old buildings that are no longer in a useable state. The money also goes towards providing the hospital with essential state of the art equipment so that the doctors and nurses can improve diagnosis and treatment and continue to treat the children with world-class care. £6 million of the budget is aimed at carrying out critical research which plays an inportant role in pioneering new ways to prevent, treat and cure complex, life-limiting and often life-threatening conditions. Patient and family support is also funded by charitable donations in order to allow parents to stay overnight, by funding meals for breast-feeding mothers, by contributing towards their multi-faith chaplaincy and by supporting patients families that need help with expenses.

The Peter Pan Legacy has been an important source of income for Great Ormond Street Hospital over many years, after JM Barrie signed all the rights over to the Hospital in 1929. The Hospital has since recived loyalties every time a production of the pay is put on as well as from the sales of the Peter Pan books and other accessories. Great Ormond Street Hospital is now set to lose this source of funding after the copywrite expires following 70 years after JM Barrie's death (The Guardian, Dec 2008).

It as a result of the reasons mentioned above that Great Ormond Street Hospital Charity was chosen as the topic for fundraising. It was proposed that an overall target of £500 should be set at the forefront of this campaign with the fundraising ideas being sponsored sporting events and also an evening of entertainment in the local area as the main source of fundraising. In order to make a decision on the most effective fundraising events, a specific target group was to be decided. A focus group was carried out following considerable thought on the different types of events available, which involved a group of individuals from the local areas who were asked to answer specific questions in an open discussion. The types of questions asked mainly focused on charitable giving, what charities they are likely to donate to and why, what woud encourage them to donate and also what would put them off donating. The results gained from this focus group posed many questions on what could be done to raise money, but overall, the most popular options appeared to be a social disco/dance evening arranged locally so that members of the community can get together and enjoy the social experience where they would be more willing to donate as it would be obvious were the money would be going.

Following much deliberation and discussion, with regards to the specific target audience (baby boomers genration, 45-64 years old) and types of events, it was decided that, in order to reach the proposed fundraising target the following events should be held: 1/2 marathon in Milton Keynes; a swimathon to take place at Wycombe Sports Centre and a Charity Elvis Night to be held at West Wycombe Village Hall. Once the specifc events had been decided, the next important task was how to publicise the events in order to gain as much awareness and participation as possible. For the two sponsored sporting events, it was felt that word of mouth would be the most effective form of marketing, but for the main Elvis event, it was felt that all forms of marketing communications should be used to create maximum publicity. Advertsing was used to promote the event by the creation of posters that were distributed around West Wycombe, around the university, and at Pizza Hut in High Wycombe town centre. Sponsorship was greatly received from the local shops in West Wycombe, with fantastic raffle prizes being donated, as well as providing facilities to help sell tickets for the event. The local pub, The Plough, supplied the bar and was also available to sell tickets.

PR was used in conjunction with the local radio station Mix107 who helped publicise the event with the use of broadcasting adverts on air throughout the week prior to the date, as well as an advert their website. In addition to this, a telephone interview was conducted and aired on the morning of the event to coincide with the adverts than had previously gone out on air. Also a press release was written to grab the attention of possible guests. Facebook was used as a from of online advertising and although it may not reach out to the specific target audience, it may generate interest around the subject of Great Ormond Street or for the event itself. The last few days before the event were used to distrubute flyers to the local community in order to sel the last remaining tickets and also to generate extra interest and encourage the local community to become more aware of the charity and the role it plays.

The event took place on Saturday 7th March in West Wycombe Village Hall and turned out to be a huge success with all guests in their dancing shoes and ready to have a great party. The atmosphere was electric and everyone waited with excited anticipation for the return of Elvis - a true legend...and that he was! Everyone rose to their feet and continued to party on long into the night forgetting all their inhibitions and just having a fabulous time reminiscing about days gone by. The publicity for the event generated just over 110 guests, with some attending as a result of the radio interviews but mainly from arount the local community. With everyone in high spirits and taking away only vibrant and ecstatic memories from this event, the awareness of the charity and the hilarities surrounding the evening rose around the village in a matter of days. Many members of the community were talking about the event for days afterwards and another similar event is on high demand. Overall, not only did the success generate increased publicity around the subject of Great Ormond Street and charitable, a profit exceeding £420 was calculated afte expenses. In order to follow up the popularity of the event, the radio station was informed about how it went and the total amount raised, also a press release was written to follow up the one written prior to the event. Many contacts have been created throughout the development of this event with the radio station being one, as well as the number of email addresses and contact details that were collected from the guests at the event itself. These were used to follow up the event to enable us to find out how much the guests gained from the experience, what they particularly enjoyed and what they feel could be altered next time.