You can support Alliance Wine’s fundraising activity for The Drinks Trust at the Edinburgh Marathon at its Just Giving page here.
What is the new fundraising initiative that Alliance Wine is partnering with The Drinks Trust for?
Simple really, it’s first and foremost to raise funds for The Drinks Trust to help it pursue its aims and goals in supporting people in the industry and be as effective as possible in all its efforts.
Alliance Wine’s digital marketing manager Lilla O’Connor has been getting the miles in to prepare for the Edinburgh Marathon
Also by merely getting involved and doing something that others will see, we hope we can bring a bit more of a spotlight onto the charity, raising its profile and making more people aware of it and what it does.
Why are you so keen to work with The Drinks Trust in particular?
In the current climate the Trust’s work has become increasingly vital and we believe supporting its work is crucial. The economy is not in a good state, we are all still recovering from the lingering economic effects of the Covid pandemic and the cost of living crisis is biting hard. Hospitality businesses are in a fairly fragile state and people in hospitality deserve and need an institution that they can turn to if they are in need, be that for financial help or otherwise. The Drinks Trust serves a great purpose of giving people someone to turn to who they know will listen when they are asking for help.
What activities is Alliance Wine undertaking to help The Drinks Trust raise funds?
Alliance Wine’s Freya Reinsch, head of sales in Scotland is also part of the company’s marathon team
The first activity we are doing is running the Edinburgh Marathon, and half-marathon, this May. Given Alliance is a Scottish company it seemed the perfect choice to kick off our fundraising efforts for the charity. There are a few committed runners in the Alliance ranks and they have been joined by others and so we have created a team of nine people from across the company who have signed up to run.
How experienced runners are you?
Marta Juega, sustainability manager & winemaker, is also part of Alliance’s marathon running team
We have some who are seasoned runners, already with marathons under their belts, and some others who really feel the cause is worthwhile and want to help and so have decided to get off the sofa and see what they can do. It’s been really lovely to see these different levels of runners coming together for the cause. You can see their individual running stories on our campaign page.
Your fundraising activity is also part of your drive to be a more sustainable business – can you explain more?
As part of our ongoing sustainability ambitions, we believe that The Drinks Trust is the perfect partner to help demonstrate our wider commitment to being sustainable in a fully holistic way.
Alliance’s Gavin Suttie, Scotland area sales manager will also be running the Edinburgh Marathon
Our sustainability strategy is now a central tenet of our overall business strategy and we plan them hand in hand. Sustainability for us rests on three key aspects: the planet, people and profit. To this end to be able to partner with The Drinks Trust gives us the opportunity to promote and reinforce one of these three keys aspects and not only internally but outwardly through the trade as we fully believe to make sustainability work we all need to work together.
What is the fundraising target for running the Edinburgh Marathon?
The sky is the limit, any donations are welcome, we would like to get to £10,000 and we are encouraging our friends, customers and suppliers to get involved.
The ups and downs of marathon training with Alliance’s Ned Llewellyn sales director for the off-trade
What else has Alliance Wine done to support The Drinks Trust?
We partnered the Trust in January, so the marathon is the first formal activity we have undertaken on its behalf. We hope that it will be the first of many as we see this association as a long-term commitment from us. We had a Drinks Trust presence at both our recent portfolio tastings, earlier this year, in Edinburgh and London allowing it to connect directly with our customers, many of whom obviously own hospitality businesses across the country. It also had a full page in our tasting booklet to help build awareness. The larger bits of activity are important keystones in the relationship, but we will always try to see if we can include The Drinks Trust in other smaller ways to keep building its profile. It all helps.
What other charity involvements does Alliance Wine have?
Another marathon team member is Alliance’s Elenor McIndoe, London on-trade account manager
Charity involvement is important to our employees, and we have various instances of people doing things for charity. One of our directors, Giles Cooke MW, set up a wine label called Our Fathers, with a commitment that all profits from the sale of the wine are donated to charitable causes.
James Mitchell, area sales manager is also part of Alliance’s Edinburgh Marathon team
Our employees are also keen to be involved in fundraisers and charitable activities, such as the Homes for Ukraine program, where one of our colleagues provided a home for a refugee family and Alliance Wine has also made a large donation to the Disasters Emergency Committee last year in the wake of the Ukrainian invasion.
How can people donate to your fundraising for the Edinburgh Marathon?
Remy Moens, Terres Fidèles operations manager putting the training in
To donate to the Edinburgh Marathon, people can visit our JustGiving team page and learn more about our runners’ individual stories.
- Alliance Wine is a supplier partner to The Buyer.
