After the Christmas period last year, Chris Salt, a Mechanical Design Engineer for Dalkia, took part in a Christmas Tree Collection for the Douglas Macmillan Hospice (DMH), a Stoke-on-Trent charity close to his heart, having provided end of life care for his grandfather.
The event required volunteers to gather used real Christmas trees from local residents and take them to a recycling centre. The DMH raised money from those who wanted their trees collecting and from the recycling centre who reclaimed the trees for woodchip.
A chilly start to the day and a snow-covered van, provided by ALD Automotive free of charge in support of the charity, didn’t deter Chris and as soon as the weather cleared, and the roads were safe to travel on he set off. However, it soon became apparent that collecting Christmas trees would be more challenging than expected when he arrived at the first house to find a tree a foot taller than him which filled most of the space in the van. This didn’t dampen his determination and four trips, and 7 hours later, he had collected 55 trees.
Dalkia is proud of Chris’ contribution to the £13,500 DMH raised from this event which saw over 950 trees collected – a great outcome that will help this charity continue to provide important palliative care for those with life-limiting illnesses.
Dalkia is committed to supporting and encouraging employees who wish to give back to society through volunteer work.