Member Article

Seaham Park Cricket and Rugby Club set the bar high for a new clubhouse

Seaham Park Cricket and Rugby Club have successfully crowdfunded over £20,000 which will enable them to fully refurbish their existing club house, in addition to covering the membership and training fees of all players at the club for the next 12 months in response to the cost of living crisis.

The club boasts over 100 senior members as well as 80 junior members across all age groups, including two girls teams.

The need to renovate the clubhouse can be traced back as far as 2012 when a fire destroyed the original clubhouse. A new clubhouse was built in 2014 but the insurance payout from the fire was only enough to cover the cost of installing a small social room with no bar area or furniture. As the club is heavily reliant on takings from the bar being used to fund the everyday running of the club, they raised the funds themselves to install a basic bar area that remains to this day.

Michael McNicholas, who led the fundraising efforts at the club said, “We’re delighted to have reached our fundraising target and the work has now begun on renovating the clubhouse which is really exciting. I’d like to thank everyone who pledged to our campaign and also the local businesses who donated some fantastic rewards which were a great help in reaching our target. At the club, we want to ensure that anyone who wants to play sport isn’t prevented from doing so by financial reasons, with our overall goal being to make sport at Seaham Cricket and Rugby Club free for all forever. Refurbishing our bar area will enable us to maximise our revenue, which will be a huge help in making our vision a reality.

In addition to securing pledges from both individuals and local businesses, the club also benefited from an £8,000 pledge from Sport England’s Places and Spaces fund. Regarding this, Michael McNicholas said “I’d happily recommend any sports club looking to crowdfund to apply for one of the funds available through Sport England. Their pledge made a big difference in reaching our goal, in addition to the tailored support we received from them throughout our campaign.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Rise .