With October Breast Cancer Awareness month, it’s a fitting time to reflect back on the extremely successful fundraising day at Princes Park on 18th May.
Rachel’s Day x Dartford Women FC was born when Rachel Ahern – one of the women’s sides former teammates – reached out to ask if they’d like to collaborate on raising some money for a good cause, close to Rachel’s heart.
In September 2024, Rachel was diagnosed with Breast Cancer at the age of 35. With the support of her family and friends, she embarked on her recovery journey and despite her difficult battle, it sparked a wish to raise awareness of the importance of women regularly checking themselves to identify changes and catch the disease early.
Rachel and Dartford Women FC put together a family fundraising day in support of the fabulous charity CoppaFeel! – an organisation who aim to raise awareness and teach young people how and why they should be checking for signs of Breast Cancer from an early age. Given Rachel’s young age at the time of her diagnosis, this particular charity felt aptly fitting.
The build up to the fun day saw the fundraising committee strive to pull together the abundance of donations made by the Club’s caring community and football family, and it was blown away by the generosity and support received!
With an overflowing stock of donated items, the day was a staggering success, filled with bouncy castles and football darts; tombola tables and group games; face painting and temporary tattoos; candle art and jewellery stalls; sweetie tables and cake sales; auctions and raffles; DJs and singers, and much, much more!!
On this beautiful, sunny day, DWFC fans, the Club and local community came together to help support the women’s side, not only in their last match of the season, but in their endeavours to help kick Cancer. Fun was had by all, but most importantly awareness of the cause was brought to the forefront of the day. Guests were able to chat with the representatives from CoppaFeel! who hosted a stall, offering information and keepsakes for people to takeaway as an ongoing reminder of the significance of the event.
Through monetary donations to the JustGiving page, bids in the auction, raffle tickets bought, purchases from the stalls, participation in the games and activities and ticket sales to the football match, the team is proud to announce an astonishing total of 🥁 🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁 £ 7 5 5 7 . 8 2
We’d like to extend our inexpressible gratitude to all who participated in achieving this sum, please know you have helped to shine a bright light on a troublesome topic.
Rachel’s Day x Dartford Women FC proved to be an example of the warmth and humanity of a community with a shared desire to support those going through Cancer and where possible, eradicate the chances of others suffering. We hope it was the first of many more future opportunities to bring people together and fundraise for this charity – so watch this space!
