GiveToLocal hires “Passionate people, Passionate places” co-creator

Rapidly growing community sports service GiveToLocal has continued the strategic expansion of its senior team with the hiring of experienced Creative Director Chris Rickaby.

Chris – a founding partner of award-winning Newcastle advertising agency Different – was part of the key strategy team that created the hugely successful campaign to brand North East England, and wrote the “Passionate people, Passionate places” line.

“Chris has a depth of experience in developing creative strategy and campaigns,” said GiveToLocal’s CEO, Neil Gardiner.

“As we continue to move forward, he will play a key part in building our brand’s awareness amongst our major stakeholders – local sports clubs, local business, sporting governing bodies and national and international corporate partners. This is just one of our recent senior appointments, in line with a strengthening and re-alignment of our core team to facilitate growth. We expect to make even more in the coming months.”

The North Tyneside-based national sports service is an organisation with a mission. GiveToLocal newly publicised and ambitious target is to drive £10,000 of new funding into each participating club per annum, with clubs simply needing to embrace the working model to benefit, a mix of tried and tested technology and hands-on support from the growing GiveToLocal team.

“Like the regional campaign I helped to create, local sport is all about passion. The culture here at GiveToLocal is driven by the same thing,” said Chris.

“It’s mission first – let’s solve the problem and get local sport funded with, at the same time, a pragmatic understanding that the operational model needs to be right to make sure that can happen sustainably. Everyone I have met here is a huge sports fan with a real desire to get things done. As a keen club tennis player, myself, I’m really looking forward to working here, and, along with the rest of team, helping to fund a viable future for local sport.”

GiveToLocal’s bold mission to sustain local sport and support local business is already taking shape. The community sports service is working with thousands of clubs across 21 sports to deliver lasting, positive change. They are already working in partnership with major governing bodies in the sports they support and building collaborative campaigns to promote adoption of the free service in clubs across the country.

“Good intentions aren’t enough,” said Neil, “we are all about getting good results and leaving a legacy. Our local sports clubs create happy environments, healthy people, and strong communities. We created GiveToLocal to protect that through free and easy access to sustainable funding.”

GiveToLocal’s national and regional partnership opportunities offer corporates the chance to align themselves with a proven service that can positively impact upon community sport clubs across the UK. A simple way for big brands to position themselves around local sport and have a positive effect on local communities right across the UK.

“Aside from his creative ideas, we are looking to Chris to help build our own creative teams here at GiveToLocal,” said Neil. “We are determined to build a dynamic, committed core creative group to help drive fund-raising for our clubs, and he has an outstanding track-record of building award-winning advertising teams that have brought millions of pounds worth of business into the region.”

Chris is Newcastle born and bred and lives in Jesmond. As well as working in advertising, he also writes thrillers under the pen-name Ben Creed. His most recent, City of Ghosts, was shortlisted alongside the likes of J.K Rowling for the Crime Writers’ Association’s prestigious Gold Dagger.

“Modern digital campaigns are all about telling the same story across different platforms,” said Chris, “writing books has helped me better understand the building blocks of a larger narrative. That understanding feeds into my advertising campaigning and vice versa.”

To find out more about GiveToLocal, visit: www.givetolocal.com