The annual lunch brings together leading businesses from across the city region to raise funds for a nominated cause and has built in notoriety since its launch in 2017. Before this year’s event, it had raised more than £75,000 for charities in the area but the 2024 total smashes the event’s fundraising into six figures, with this year’s funds going to support our life-changing youth work.
Liverpool FC Women’s ambassador and all-time top goal-scorer, England international and broadcast pundit, Natasha Dowie, was the lunch’s keynote speaker and spent time with Charlotte here at The Hive before the event. She said: “The event at Anfield was a pleasure to be involved in. I’m so happy we raised a record amount which will go towards an amazing cause. I am looking forward to working with The Hive in the future to help positively impact young peoples lives.”
LSWL organiser, Clare Brookfield, said: “We are blown away by the amount we have raised this year. Last year’s amount was so huge, the worry was we couldn’t beat this – and here we are with another record. Thank you to all the committee, our incredible sponsors and all our guests who helped us reach this amazing figure. We know what impact this money will have and this is the reason we continue to support local charities with our event.”
Our CEO, Jayne Wilson, said: “Frankly, it’s hard to find the words to describe our reaction to such an incredible donation – the phone call telling us the final tally involved a lot of screaming! It takes £1.4m to run our building and deliver our expert youth work every year, and most of that sum has to be fundraised: The Hive’s work cannot happen without the generosity of so many people, businesses and funders, and Liverpool Sportswoman’s Lunch is a huge part of that this year. Thank you so much to the committee, to Natasha, to the sponsors and to all of the attendees for digging so deep to raise this sum – and most of all, thanks to Charlotte for getting up on stage and speaking to an audience about what we do. Every penny will go towards helping make sure young people on the Wirral have somewhere safe to go, something positive to do and someone trusted to talk to, which young people tell us they need more than ever before.”