Our annual Christmas Tree Collection has once again seen volunteers collecting a record number of trees across the Fylde coast and seen more money than ever donated towards the outstanding care we provide.

The weekend’s collection saw 110 volunteers working out of 48 vans across Friday, Saturday and Sunday to collect pre-booked Christmas trees for recycling. In total, they collected more than 2,200 trees.

And the campaign has raised an incredible £31,200!

The trees were deposited at recycling points at Ashworth Road and Bristol Avenue in Blackpool, North Beach Car Park in St Annes, where trees will be replanted as part of an ongoing project to restore the sand dunes, and HASSRA Sports Pavilion in Thornton, where the trees were chipped on site.

The event was once again sponsored by Easthams Solicitors and Ameon, with support from James Andrew Tree Surgeon, Amazon which provided vans and volunteers for the collection, Blackpool Council and Fylde Borough Council.

We’re absolutely thrilled that each year we see this event growing, with more and more trees being booked resulting in even more donations coming to our hospice. It’s a tall order for our volunteers to collect so many trees, but each year our teams come out in force to support us in this wonderful way.

We’re seeing more businesses coming forward to be part of this incredible weekend, offering groups of volunteers and vans to help us reach as many homes as possible.

This year we saw an increase in the number of collections from people in PR4 post codes, which is fantastic. It shows the word really is getting out there that we are the place for recycling Christmas trees.

This annual scheme means so much to us; not only are we providing a service for our local communities, but the donations mean we’re also providing a vital service to local families who need hospice care. Plus we’re doing our bit to help the environment at Christmas at this time of year.

A huge thank you to our sponsors and supporters, our volunteers and to everyone who booked a tree collection. We can’t wait to do it all again next year!