Serving the Teesside Business Community | 11
We raised £27,000 in our sleep!
Charity dreamers: Teesside business
leaders ahead of the sleepout.
S
everal Tees Business clients were
among business leaders who swapped
their laptops for sleeping bags to sleep
rough for the night, raising £27,000 towards
creating training and job opportunities for
long-term unemployed Teessiders.
The Victorian Street at Preston Park
Museum played host to 45 businessmen and
women as part of CEO Sleepout, a national
fundraising phenomenon that began on
Teesside.
Tees Business threw its weight behind the
event for a second successive year.
CEO Sleepout has already raised nearly
£1.5 million to fight homelessness and
poverty around the country.
Since the first CEO Sleepout at
Middlesbrough FC’s Riverside Stadium in
2013, business leaders have slept rough at a
range of landmark venues including Wembley
Stadium, The Oval, Lord’s, Manchester’s
Emirates Old Trafford and Durham Cathedral.
Tees Business co-editor Dave Allan
joined fellow businesspeople on the
sleepout, including several of our clients,
among them The Build Directory’s Alisdair
Beveridge, Jamie Marsay of Applied Scientific
Technologies, Ian Donley of Tees Valley
Innovation, Reuben Hanlon of Linthorpe
Interiors and Café Lilli owner Roberto Pittalis.
Also involved were Kimberley Turner
of Double Eleven, Bespoke Motor Works
directors Daniel King and Russell Jackson,
Cleveland Security’s Christine Baker and
Gavin Scotchbrook of Stratus Technologies,
Teesside University’s Warren Harrison,
Tees Business co-editor Dave Allan
(left) with CEO Sleepout’s Andy
Preston and Bianca Robinson.
From left: Roberto Pittalis (Cafe Lilli), Alisdair
Beveridge (The Build Directory) and Jamie
Marsay (Applied Scientific Technologies).
Richard Bendelow of 888 Properties and
Espresso Web directors Greg Langstaff and
Stephen Robinson.
Further funds were raised when Tees firm
Upex Pies donated funds from sales of their
products at the event.
CEO Sleepout’s founder-chairman Andy
Preston added: “The money will help to
Reuben Hanlon (Linthorpe Interiors) with
Richard Bendelow (888 Properties).
fund exciting Fork in the Road plans that will
allow us to change even more lives in 2018,
while we’ll also be able to support some of
Teesside’s greatest poverty fighters including
the Moses Project in Stockton and local food
banks in the run-up to Christmas and into
January, when demand for their services
reaches its peak.”