Trusts & Foundations (2024)

The Bednight Funding Gap is the funding gap between the tariff paid by the guest and the true cost to us as a centre per guest, per night. To keep stays affordable for our guests, this must be covered by our fundraising.

We can also ringfence these funds to particular groups of guests, so, whether your charitable aims encompass beneficiaries from particular counties, of certain ages or with specific disabilities (among other criteria), we can ensure these aims are met.

There is plenty of equipment required to keep our centre running smoothly. Your generous donation can be used to purchase the necessary kit for our guests. The equipment required varies, but some examples include:

• General Equipment – this could include the general maintenance or specific purchase of equipment either for our activities (like archery bows or climbing ropes) or facilities (like bed linen, a pool table or curtains)
• Capital Equipment – this refers to equipment that would need to be put on our asset register due to the higher price and worth. Current needs on this list includes, but is not limited to
  • an accessible shuttle buggy
  • accessible bikes
  • canoes
  • hoists – from mobile electric to manual, these allow for easy use of accommodation and facilities for our guests
  • outdoor swing set and play area
  • appliances for accommodation

Located on the edge of Exmoor, we are proud to maintain our estate of outstanding facilities for our guests.

Your donations and support enable us to maintain the highest quality and continue improving our facilities to do the best by our guests and the environment.

Grants towards this area could cover:

• Accommodation refurbishments
• Estate renovations such as fencing, doors and roofing
• Swimming pool improvements
• Pathways and fencing for activity areas
• Solar PV panels

Bursaries enable us to make our breaks and visits even more affordable and ensure we are able to reach those who need our services most.

To meet your own charitable aims, we can ringfence our bursary donations to be allocated to specific bookings that contain people of particular criteria. This could include age, type of disability and the counties they are coming from to visit us, among others.

Read more about our bursary scheme here…

We were incredibly pleased to have the support of Pets Foundation, who funded the purchase of a new Bennington ‘Fun Bug’ Carriage.

This carriage was bought to replace the previous carriage and is purpose-built, so that the carriage is lighter, more manoeuvrable and more practical for riders and horses. It’s more open, with no sides, to avoid the rider feeling confined and they can see more around them.

Riders can sit in the seat or go on in a wheelchair, to sit aside the driver and maybe even take the reins!

This project is ongoing and is supported by a multitude of funders.

As a charity, we subsidise our rates to ensure our services are financially accessible. As you can imagine, this comes with a cost to us as a centre, which we call the Bednight Funding Gap. This is the gap between the amount guests contribute to their stay and the true cost to us as a centre. We must fundraise for this in order to ensure more guests are able to benefit from the Calvert Exmoor experience.

Funders across the UK have been kind enough to support this cause recently. Some have chosen to restrict this funding for guests from particular areas, or of particular ages or living with specific disabilities, in order to abide by their own charitable aims.

Recent successes include:

• Funding for guests with Learning Difficulties
• Funding for guests under the age of 25 with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities
• Funding for guests from Devon

In the last year, we have managed to secure funding from a variety of sources for over £54,000 towards the revitalisation of our fleet of accessible bikes.

With regular use over many years, many within our fleet of accessible bikes were in need of replacing. From accessible e-trikes to front-loading bikes that allow a wheelchair to be secured at the front and with even more bikes on the way, we are incredibly excited to be able to offer this incredibly popular sport to even more of our guests with varying needs.

With a centre built around a Grade II listed farmstead, much of our historical artifacts include original mechanisms for a waterwheel, which can be seen in our barn.

Due to age and natural degradation over almost three decades, a listed door that protects the waterwheel was in need of replacement and is temporarily boarded up, as seen in the picture.

A generous funder has awarded a grant to replace this waterwheel door and we are eagerly awaiting its arrival, any day now!

OurBursary Schemehas multiple funders. Having awarded £36,000 in bursaries last year, we are aiming to award even more this year.

An incredibly generous funder recently donated a large sum to our Bursary Scheme specifically to be used for those under the age of 18, which, with our recent influx of school visits, has meant more children from these schools have been able to benefit from the Calvert Exmoor experience!

With frequent use over the years, many canoes within our fleet have been in need of refurbishment or replacement. This last year, we were grateful to receive funding that ensured the purchase of two new Enigma Canoes.

We are still in need of two more of these canoes to complete our fleet.

As you can imagine, the frequent use of our safety equipment on our rope-based activities like abseiling, climbing and crate stacking, involves frequent replacements or maintenance. While we have a budget for general maintenance, the cost of replacing many of our equipment items would exceed this, so we also raise money for this as a project.

We were very grateful to receive a donation that saw the purchase of some new Figure 8 metalwork devices, which are used for descending smoothly in abseiling.

From farrier visits, vet bills and stables maintenance to staff time and field maintenance, each of our twelve horses are estimated to cost the centre £8,000 a year. With that in mind, many funders who prefer to support equine-related causes choose to donate core funding that is ringfenced for use by the Equestrian Centre.

We have multiple funders supporting our Equestrian Centre, from funding staff training and apprenticeship schemes to core costs associated with running the centre.

For example, a kind funder has recently agreed to fund the cost of vital work to fencing around one of our horse fields. This is greatly appreciated, as it not only affects the wellbeing of our horses, but, by doing so, affects the experience of our guests. This was not an expense that we, as a charity, were able to pay and we are incredibly grateful for the foundation’s award.

From apprenticeship schemes to staff qualifications, we often receive grant funding towards the all-important development of our incredible staff.

Some examples of funding towards this cause:

• Equestrian Centre Apprenticeship scheme
• Activity Instructor Apprenticeship scheme
• Watersports qualifications
• Internal and external training for introduction of new activities