Now that the festive season is over, and the new year is well and truly underway, what does the future hold for baby hospice Zoe’s Place?
Zoe’s Place faced closure last year due to lack of funding, but with the generous spirit of Liverpool, the baby hospice was saved.
The hospice raised an impressive £7.5m to help keep it open.
The appeal was started by West Derby MP Ian Byrne and was continued by Liverpool stars such as MMA fighter Paddy the Baddy, Singer Jamie Webster and comedian Adam Rowe.
However, Zoe’s Place costs £1.8m a year to keep open.
Lily Brazier, Corporate Fundraiser at Zoe’s Place, explained to MerseyNewsLive about the struggles of keeping the hospice open.
“We managed to achieve the capital appeal to help build a new hospice – however the running costs are a massive struggle to get every year.
“The amount of donations since we announced the potential closure has been amazing and really what we needed.”
Lily added: “The potential closure was the worse situation ever but the best publicity we have ever had, and we could have never off afforded that kind of publicity.”
The hospice raised £28,000 during the Santa Dash last month and had the most runners in the dash ever.
Half a million pounds was raised in November during an incredible cycle to India.
Some of the Zoe’s Place staff and volunteers cycled 450 kilometres across India to raise money for the hospice.
“We have so many amazing fundraising events to look forward to,” Lily said.
“We have the Canoe challenge, where you can race colleagues down the Liverpool Leeds canal and stop at a few pubs – which is always really fun … and we are hoping on putting a ball at the end of the year.”
The community spirit of Liverpool was unprecedented when Zoe’s Place announced their potential closure.
Lily said: “Having the whole of Liverpool on board has been instrumental to keeping Zoe’s Place open, if it was any other city we don’t think it would have stayed open.
“We are so thankful that we had the support of the whole community to keep Zoe’s place open.”
Featured image (c) Hannah Towler
