Offaly business's raffle raises over €6,000 for Hooves for Hospice

HEALY Family Meats in Banagher, County Offaly, through their own initiative and support of Birr Lions Club led by their past president Ken Enright and current president Ronan O’Hare, organised a very successful fundraising project which raised €6,100 for Hooves 4 Hospice.

Healy Family Meats is a small family owned and operated meat business, established in 1943, producing quality meats for over 70 years.

Today Healy Family Meats involves Michael and Eileen's children, "the upcoming third generation" who help out with different aspects of the business.

Laura explained that coming up to Christmas last year, “we decided as a business we wanted to give a little back and we thought Hooves 4 Hospice was the perfect charitable organisation that we were looking to give a little back to, after discovering that the Midland region of Laois, Offaly, Longford and Westmeath is the only region in Ireland that does not have a level 3 Hospice. Not having a full service means patients with complex symptoms which cannot be managed at home care have to be transferred to an acute hospital, often through a busy A&E Department”.

The purpose of the Hooves 4 Hospice project is to raise vital funds for the cost of building the planned Midland Regional Hospice.

“Our fundraising within Healy Family Meats was a chance for people to give back over the Christmas period and allowed us and our customers to get behind this mission to build a hospice in the Midlands, a hospice for ourselves and future generations. Our fundraising and the generous donations of the public was a small step in helping this mission to be accomplished in order to help support patients and their families with the best Palliative or Hospice Care Services, allowing patients to be looked after to the highest quality with all the medical, emotional, and professional support that they and their families need,” said Laura.

Instead of selling the animal directly in the mart, David and Tory Baker, members of Birr Lions Club kindly agreed to sell their heifer to Healy Family Meats Butchers to help maximise the fundraising efforts.

“When the animal was prepared and frozen we looked at different ways to get the most benefit of the animal for our fundraiser for Hooves 4 Hospice,” explained Laura who works in the Healy Family Meats business as a Food Safety, Quality and Production Brand Assistant Manager.

“It was decided that we would halve the beef meat into two sides. One customer purchased one whole side and then we decided that as it was coming up to Christmas that we would raffle the other side of beef along with some other hampers. We got lots of support and publicity through social media and word of mouth and it was a great success. We were overwhelmed by the response to the fundraiser from our customers who were very supportive and generous, particularly as it was for a very deserving cause.’’

The fundraising project for Hooves 4 Hospice involved three raffle prizes which were all drawn at random using an online randomer name selector. 1st Prize was a 100% Grass-Fed Hereford Heifer Quality Side of Beef, donated by David and Tory Baker, which was bred, reared and finished on their farm in Birr and won by Karl and Blaithin Monahan. 2nd Prize was a Mixed Meat won by Martin Hanamy. 3rd Prize was Free Range Turkey and Home Cured Ham, donated by Healy Family Meats. Won by Nicola Kelly.

The Healy family are very grateful to everybody who purchased the tickets and made the draw the success that it was.

“ We were delighted to support the building a hospice in the Midlands, for ourselves and future generations. The end-of-life deserves as much beauty, care and respect as the beginning. Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much,” concluded Laura.