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At the end of 2023, Lexus Hedge End were able to support the Meon Valley Lions Club (CIO) in their mission to help clubs, hospices, organisations, and other local charities fulfil their objectives within the community.
A local club of volunteers, the Meon Valley Lions rely heavily on their minibus to ensure that those who are unable to attend various activities within the community are able to do so. With their minibus playing such a vital role in their organisation, it was our pleasure to be able to make a donation to them that will help them to continue to offer this fantastic service.
Since then, as a result of our donation, combined with a range of other supporters through their appeal, we are delighted that the Lions have been able to replace their former minibus.
We spoke to Brian Edwards, to tell us all about the Lions Club and what they do for the community:
The Meon Valley Lions is a local charitable club serving an area between Knowle Village to the south up to Warnford in the north along the river Meon. There are several other Lions clubs in the area that border or community which we call a district that we are a part of. All Lions clubs are part of a worldwide Charity organisation Lions Club International which is the largest charitable organisation in the world. The Lions Club Motto is "We Serve”.
We currently have 27 members in our club with as many again Friends of Lions who help us at events. We all primarily professional people with the majority of us of pensionable age, although that is not a requirement to join the club. We all give our time freely to the club. Our club members numbers are good and we have more or less the optimum number of people to run a successful club.
Our primary aim is to raise funds to assist our local community for those in need. Our Minibus is a very important asset to almost everything we do. Its used by the club to support all manner of clubs and organisations in the community and to assist in getting members of the public to events that they wouldn’t otherwise be able to attend, due to lack of a car, or public transport.
We don't charge anyone, we grant usage of the bus and cover all costs within our club funds. We raise our funds through various events throughout the year. Our main fund raising comes in the summer providing large BBQ's for fetes and we also run and organise the Swanmore Village Fete in July each year. In December our Minibus and Santa's sleigh is out and about all the villages in our area spreading cheer and collecting funds to help those less fortunate.
Although our main purpose as a club is to serve the community we also have lots of fun attending social events and outings together as Lions and friends, so its not all hard work.
Our previous Minibus was very tired and becoming unreliable needed replacing as its was getting expensive to maintain. Lexus responded brilliantly to our fund raising campaign and with the geneorus donation they gave the club it went towards helping us to raise the funds needed to replace the old bus for which we are very grateful.
Having a newer and reliable vehicle is a bonus for us and we hope to promote its availability to the community so that we get maximum use from it. Its already getting noticed and its in use most weeks to get people out and about in the Meon Valley and beyond to events.
We have received lots of excellent & positive feedback from everyone who has been on the bus and I’m even getting more drivers volunteering to drive it.
