On 2nd July 2018, on a glorious day, teams, sponsors and supporters took part in the 20th anniversary of the ACI UK Annual Charity Golf Day at the prestigious Buckinghamshire Golf Club .  All teams tee’d off at the 8.30 a.m. shotgun start (after breakfast sponsored once again by IHS Markit), finishing in good time to join the presentation of our 56th Variety Sunshine Coach to teachers and children from West Hill School, Leatherhead, Surrey.

2018 Event Sponsors

Many congratulations to our winning teams – ECI Partners (1st), LCH (2nd) and C Hoare & Co. (3rd) – and to individual prize winners Fraser Devlin, Barracuda FX (Straightest Drive) and Dan Beale, (Longest Drive).   And a massive thank you to our teams, sponsors and supporters for their generous contribution to the day’s success and enabling us to fund our 56th Sunshine Variety Coach.

This event is made possible only by the generosity of our teams, supporters and sponsors and ACI UK and Variety are enormously grateful that, once again, you stepped up to ensure that we could present another Coach to a very deserving school.

In addition to the teams that played in this year’s competition, this year’s sponsors were MarketFactory (players’ buggies) who stepped in at very late notice after a sponsor dropped out, IHS Markit (breakfast), ParFX (Straightest Drive) and Equinix (Longest Drive), Sucden Financial  and ACI FMA (event programme ads).

In addition, auction and raffle items were donated by organisations and individuals including:  Fielding & Nicholson, Nex/EBS, and a number of ACI UK Committee members.

On behalf of ACI UK and Variety, thank you all very, very much for keeping this event in the ACI calendar and ensuring that a deserving school gets a new and much needed vehicle to support its special educational needs.

Event Gold Sponsor

Players, supporters, ACI UK Committee Members and Variety ambassadors join the staff and children of West Hill School for the presentation of their new Sunshine Coach – the first in the new ACI branding!

“To date we have had limited resources available to us to encourage this. A new minibus will make an enormous difference to our pupils and staff on a daily basis. We will be able to take every child at West Hill off site at least once a week to local parks, libraries, shops and community events, to name a few. Day trips further afield will now be a viable option. The impact on the children’s education and development will be incredibly enhanced, for years to come, as a result.”

Judy Nettleton, Headteacher, West Hill School

2018 Winners

First Place – EC1 Partners

Second Place – LCH

Third Place – C Hoare & Co

Longest Drive – Fraser Devlin, Barracuda FX

Straightest Drive – Dan Beale

Give us your feedback!

We are very aware that our sponsors, supporters and team captains have to work increasingly hard to persuade marketing departments to make room for this event in ever-tightening annual budgets and we are enormously grateful for their continuing commitment and support.  To ensure the success of this event going forward, we welcome your feedback.  Click here to complete a short survey.

The annual ACI UK Charity Golf Day is a flagship fixture in the ACI UK event calendar and the Buckinghamshire Golf Club course is acknowledged by all as a great course to play.

With the enthusiasm of the teams and support of VPAR, Buckinghamshire staff and the broader ACI UK Committee, we had a very happy and successful day; however, we had fewer teams than in previous years and overall funds available to Variety were reduced significantly.  We will be seeking input from teams and sponsors on how we ensure that we can continue to meet our funding targets and keep donating Sunshine Coaches in future years.

We recognise that it is increasingly difficult to gain internal support for these types of event and recognise that our biggest challenge, always, will be finding sufficient numbers of teams and sponsors.

It is also imperative that we have a strong Golf Committee to deliver the next event;  if you are interested (and able) to play a direct part in delivering this fantastic event again in the future please contact tina.kane@aci-uk.com.

Link to more photos at Variety – the Children’s Charity

For the first time, the 2018 competition included ‘penalty chips’ for each team, “awarded” to individuals for a range of ‘offences’ including going into the sand or water, or taking more than 3 putts to hole a ball.  Holders of penalty chips at the end of the game paid £10 per chip into the Sunshine Coach pot.  Feedbackfrom players was that this was a fun and welcome addition and we will look at more on-course fundraising activity for 2019 and beyond.

Once again, our auction and raffle contributed significantly to the day’s fund-raising and included a bespoke suit (Fielding & Nicholson), a 4-ball at the Buckinghamshire and lunch at Hawsksmoor (John Bogue/FX Morning).

Other generous auction and raffle items were donated by Nex Markets, Variety UK and ACI UK Committee Members.

In addition to the auction, players supported a raffle which, with the auction proceeds, made a considerable additional contribution to our fund-raising effort.  Our most sincere thanks to all who donated auction and raffle items, provided items for players’ goody bags or otherwise supported the event.

With sincerest thanks to all players, sponsors, prize donors and event supporters.