Could you look after a can for Guide Dogs appeal?

Guide Dogs is severely short of local volunteers willing to drop off and look after counter-top donations boxes of the type often seen in shops and offices.

As part of the celebrations commemorating 80 years since Britain’s first guide dogs completed their training, Guide Dogs is looking to recruit 80 people to carry out this work - and they would be delighted to hear from someone in the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth area.

The boxes raise a minimum £32 each, so 80 volunteers each placing twelve boxes would raise £30,720 for Guide Dogs – every year. The boxes are also visual reminders of the work done by Guide Dogs to help blind and partially sighted people achieve mobility and independence.

Being a collection box coordinator is not a time-consuming job. You keep in touch with the businesses to check when the boxes are full, then empty them, count up the money and bank it, as well as issuing a letter of thanks and a receipt.

Guide Dogs is also encouraging people to put the “fun” into “fundraising” by organising social events.

From coffee mornings to dinner parties and - particularly with Hallowe’en coming up, fancy dress parties - the variety of events you can organise to help Guide Dogs is limited only by your imagination.

There are 180,000 blind or partially sighted people in the UK who never leave home alone and Guide Dogs needs your help to give them their independence.

Since the first guide dog partnerships qualified in 1931, the charity has created 29,022 partnerships.

To become a collection box co-ordinator, call 0845 371 7771. To request a special Get Together fundraising pack or information on organising an event, call the Guide Dogs fundraising team on 0870 600 2323, register online at www.guidedogs.org.uk/gettogether or email [email protected].