Latest NatWest CricketForce email update - January 27

This is a copy of the email sent to all registered NatWest CricketForce 2005 club contacts on January 27 2005

Hello - here's the latest news update on NatWest CricketForce 2005 for all our registered clubs.

If you have only recently signed up and haven't received a mail from us before, we'll be sending out information updates on a regular basis between now and the big weekend!

Magnet

First off, we're pleased to announce that Magnet have joined forces with us to offer clubs taking part in NatWest CricketForce 2005 some great discounts.

They are offering the following:

• 60 per cent off trade kitchen units
• 50 per cent off doors and windows
• 35 per cent off flooring and hardware
• Other products - price on application

Each club will need to contact their local branch (from January 31 onwards) - you can find more details here

Magnet have also agreed to supply ECB with a trade kitchen up to a value of £1,000 as an award to the most deserving CricketForce club. ECB will determine the winner of the kitchen prize in due course.

Updating your CricketForce event details

If, since you registered your club for NatWest CricketForce online, you have made some significant progress with planning your event, and wish to update your Event Summary details with ECB - then we'd be happy to hear from you.

It'll give us a far clearer picture of what is going to be happening around the country on the CricketForce weekend.

Please email us at cricketforce@ecb.co.uk - put EVENT DETAILS UPDATE in your email subject line to help us on the admin side - and please clearly give us the Cricket Club Name and the Contact Name that you originally entered when you registered, to enable us to tie up the records quickly.

Latest NatWest CricketForce 2005 news and suggestions

• At the time of writing, we have 475 clubs registered for CricketForce - which is a tremendous response!
• Clubs should now be looking to collate local publicity e.g. letters to all members (players, administrators, officials, groundstaff, children, parents, social members and any other volunteers from within the club)
• Externally, visits/presentations should be arranged with local community businesses and Local Authorities to ask for support in the form of staff time/expertise, resources and materials. You may wish to take along a copy of the free CricketForce DVD/CD-Rom. Please be aware that local businesses may not be aware of what NatWest CricketForce is and therefore you should approach them on the basis of them not knowing.
• Clubs may benefit from involving local schools/sports colleges - particularly young leaders, children involved within the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme at your local Sports College, Scouts, Brownies, Cadets (Army/RAF etc) and any other local community groups
• Press/media coverage should be a part of your communication strategy locally leading up to the event. If you do not have contacts in local media (written and broadcast), please be sure to call the appropriate office and get your contacts list produced. Local newspapers are always looking out for future events for news/sport/feature coverage - particularly if you are well-organised and can provide them with precise and easy-to-use information. It helps if you have a good hook for any stories - such as the involvement of young England/County players/female cricketers/past players/local groups/unusual stories etc.
• Please be sure to use the correct event title NatWest CricketForce 2005 in any publicity material you produce, and do try and get all media to do the same in their publications
• A quantity of CricketForce T-shirts will be delivered to the named contact on the registration form by mid-March
• The Whitbread group (i.e. Marriot Hotels, Travel inns etc) have agreed to offer clubs the opportunity to have free furniture/fittings when they are changing their requirements. This will be coordinated internally at ECB and clubs on the registration list will be notified if furniture etc becomes available. In all cases the furniture will have to be collected and transported by each club

If you have any success stories leading up to the event that you wish to share with the rest of our clubs and cricket community please let us know - mail us at cricketforce@ecb.co.uk and give us as much detail as possible. We will try and highlight as many as possible on ecb.co.uk over the coming weeks. You don't need to write complete articles for us, just give us the basic facts, what you've got planned, and key figures involved.

If you do produce press releases, however, and want to mail them to us - we'd be happy to receive them at cricketforce@ecb.co.uk - and we'll use as many of them as we can

We will continually update you on any future progress and opportunities, but for the meantime do try and encourage as many people as possible from within the club and from the local community to support your NatWest CricketForce weekend on April 2-3.

This is going to be the largest cricket club volunteering event ever and will gain local, regional and national coverage. The more your club puts in to this event the more they will get in return from it!

We hope everything is going well for you so far. More from the CricketForce team soon.