A huge thank you to all of our partners and the 234 corporate volunteers who gave their time, energy, belongings and cash in support of our Crisis at Christmas project in 2024. We simply would not be able to deliver our essential services for people experiencing homelessness over the festive season without your unwavering support.
Volunteers
Specsavers – A huge thank you to the dozens of Specsavers volunteers who provided essential eye and ear care to people experiencing homelessness at our Christmas clinics across Great Britain again this year.
Lloyds Banking Group - We welcomed more amazing volunteers from Lloyds Banking Group again this Christmas, with over 350 colleagues volunteering in our Christmas hotels and Skylight centres, Pop-Up Shop and warehouse, donation collections, and at our Christmas Carol Service. Lloyds Banking Group also sourced and packed 2,000 Christmas care parcels (totalling £100,000) which were then distributed to our hotel guests and members, offering some festive sparkle to people experiencing homelessness over the Christmas period. One of our hotel guests said:
“I have just received my Christmas gift bag.... All I can say is WOW, I'm totally overwhelmed by generosity.... Thank you so much.”
Fundraisers
The Financial Times have given their support to Crisis at Christmas for three decades, providing us with pro bono advertising space in two of their December publications to allow us to fundraise in support of our festive project through our corporate partnerships. This year, our activation saw 10 corporate partners raise an incredible £160,000 by taking part in our FT activation; a huge thank you to our gold-tier partners Lloyds Banking Group, Staycity, Specsavers and GSK, and our silver-tier partners XPS Group, Watches of Switzerland Group, Foster + Partners, NHBC, Policy Expert and Orrick for taking part in the campaign this year.
Novuna staff came together to deliver their annual Crisis at Christmas Fundraising campaign, with 113 colleagues donating a total of £6,449, which was match funded by Novuna to reach an incredible grand total of £12,998.
Bensons For Beds - In addition to fundraising for Crisis by donating £5 for every Slumberland product sold in their stores across December, the amazing team at Bensons For Beds collected clothing and bathroom items for Crisis at Christmas guests in donation bins across their network of stores, which arrived in our London warehouse in time for Christmas.
Papa John’s - We welcomed our friends at Papa John’s back onboard for a renewal of our long-standing festive partnership; kicking off with a generous donation of £600 worth of vouchers (the equivalent of over 240 XXL pizza slices!) for Christmas volunteers, the organisation has also donated over £10,000 across December from sales on their website, which will be active across the whole of 2025.
Apex Hotels chose to redirect their corporate gifting budget this Christmas, making a generous donation to Crisis while helping to sharing the message of the Crisis at Christmas campaign among their corporate clients.
Blue Arrow Recruitment (one of the signatories of our Homelessness Covenant) raised almost £12,000 for Crisis at Christmas.
Skep Wax Records put on a fantastic festive gig in the run up to Christmas, raising over £2,000 for Crisis. An extended thank you to performers on the night; Heavenly, Brian Bilston and Swansea Sound! Diolch yn fawr iawn!
Tottenham Hotspur Foundation donated £1,000 in support of the project.
Consumer Energy Solutions, Swansea - Thank you for raising funds for our work to end homelessness through your staff ‘Christmas Jumper’ day. It was lovely to welcome your staff at our local Carol Service, joining us in celebrating the work of our South Wales Skylight at Christmas.
Gift-in-kind donors
Watches of Switzerland Group generously donated watches to our Saville Row pop up shop, enabling us to raise £140,000 in support of our work to end homelessness.
Virgin Media O2 - As part of our year-long Community Calling partnership, Virgin Media O2 and Hubbub provided Crisis at Christmas with an incredible 200 smart phones, which were distributed to our Christmas guests (along with SIM cards and data packages) by our advice teams in hotels and day centres. 51 tablets were also provided to the project to allow Christmas volunteers to register guests upon arrival.
UNIQLO - Skylight Merseyside, Skylight London and the Crisis at Christmas warehouse team received pallets upon pallets of new clothing from our friends at Uniqlo, including thermal innerwear to help keep our Christmas guests and members warm through the cold snap.
The Wimbledon Foundation donated 1,000 premium quality Championship towels to our festive project, which were distributed to our hotel guests and day centre visitors over the Christmas period.
John Frieda provided essential haircare products, including 100 shampoo and 300 conditioner bottles, to keep our Christmas guests looking and feeling rejuvenated.
Houseful staff generously gave items to a Crisis at Christmas donations drive held in their London office, collecting shampoos, conditioners and other bathroom items, alongside warm clothing like coats and jumpers, which were whizzed over to the Christmas warehouse.
Technical Services Logistics donated food items and water to our Christmas hotels over the festive period.
A huge thank you also to all of our donors in Scotland, including Campbells Meat, Graham’s Family Dairy, Phantassie and Vegware who kindly provided all of the meat, dairy produce, fresh fruit and vegetables used to make the hundreds of hot meals that went out to people experiencing homelessness across Edinburgh and the Lothians over the past month.
If you would like to get involved in supporting Crisis in 2025 and beyond, please get in touch via corporatepartnerships@crisis.org.uk