Today is the day we are finally launching the website to start telling the world about The British Family Fayre. It has been a massive roller coaster to just get to this point and now the fun really begins!
The idea I think, was a joint one that started off as a simple invitation to some of the amazing people we have met and had contact with so far, to join us for a little party in our back garden. It would be our way of saying thank you for being so supportive and thank you for staying true to Britain. Then, as our ideas have a habit now of doing, the idea grew. Why not take over the green in Westerham for the day and let these super companies show how they make what they make and show the local public that there is more made in Britain than they thought.
This was where we started about 2 months ago with an open letter to the parish council to see if we would be allowed to follow through on our little scheme. Before we could meet with them we sent out a Tweet to our loyal twitter followers, to see if British businesses would actually want to come and show off how they make or produce things for the day. 24 hours later we had over 100 businesses both local and national wanting to come and join us!
As you can imagine this was far more than we had ever anticipated. As the meeting with the council loomed this meant the plans had to change and grow once again. The meeting was a real success apart from the small problem of space. We all agreed that the green was just not big enough to hold that number of stalls and that as it backs onto an A road it would not be very safe if a good crowd decided to turn out for the event. There is a large recreation ground very close to us where we hear the whoops and screams of the local football teams each Sunday and we thought as it is flat and large this would be the new perfect venue for the event. This was shot down though as they have a grant to level the pitches ready for the Winter season so the vast majority will be no-go zones for the Summer. Not good!
The last resort was to see whether the Squerreyes estate who own most of the land in Westerham would be able to accommodate us near the stunning house and in their grounds. After a few more meetings and a trip or two to the pub we had a date and a venue, and quite a spectacular one it was too.
However, just before we went on our Easter tour we were contacted by a very large events company who potentially wanted to help us to put the event on and take it to a whole new level, a London Level! The events the had managed in the past were huge and very well know and I will admit we were thrilled that someone saw so much potential in our idea. We waited until we returned from the South West and started the meetings process again. This was a very tense week as we started to try to think what it might look like in somewhere as amazing as Olympia or Earls Court. This was, however, not to be. We have said all along that this year is about discovery and learning about British products and manufacturing, we don’t get paid we just have an unforgettable year. Trying to take the British Fayre to such a massive arena was going to mean charging all the businesses huge rates to be their and this would really defeat the object of getting small and start up businesses into the limelight for a weekend.
Back to the drawing board and I will admit that now we were starting to panic. We had no official date, venue, website or anything else and it was edging towards the end of April. The prospect of getting an event from nothing to the amazing pictures in our heads in less than 4 months was daunting at best. We tweeted about our plight and asked if there was a local events company that might be able to help us and low and behold along came out knights in shining armour. Lincoln West is a relatively small, brilliantly local and relatively new events company, specialising in trade shows. They offered to meet us to see if there was anything that they could do to help. There was instant chemistry!
This was the 1st of a few meetings over the last 2 weeks and now we have the 3 things we did not have 2 weeks ago. The venue is to be Squerreyes Court, a stunning site with the house that has stood in the same place for the last 800 years and beautiful gardens and grounds galore. We will occupy the fields in front of the house and with that and the South Downs as a backdrop it should be really beautiful. The weekend we have chosen is 31st August and 1st September and now after a good few nights of burning the midnight oil, this is the website;
http://www.britishfamilyfayre.co.uk
We are so excited about the fact that this will now go ahead and hopefully be a completely unique event and something that will stay in the memory of all who join us. This really is where you come in…
If you have a business that manufactures in the UK we would love to hear from you by going to the website and completing an application form. We want the weekend to be a fabulous, fun, family day out with people using the things the make in all manner of whacky ways to entertain. We also want you to tell your story about why you still manufacture or produce in the UK. We want all who visit to go away and ask for British products when they shop. More than anything we want everyone to have fun and celebrate British goods and products.
If you are not a business owner then we would love you to register your interest for tickets on the website. This will hopefully give us an idea of whether we are catering for a hundred people or thousands of people and make sure that we can plan appropriately.
Thank you again to you all for supporting us so whole heartedly so far and we cannot wait to meet as many of you as possible when you join us at The British Family Fayre!
– Emily, James & Lucan X
Congratulations! This is such a huge undertaking, but one which hopefully will inspire many and prove an enjoyable and successful event all round.
Oh, I do like the thumb-print logo. Is this the new official logo or is this still to be agreed upon?
Thanks for your support. The thumb print is just somehting I knocked up. We might have some news about an offical kitemark soon! watch this space.