Our Charity

Longridge On The Thames - Be Part of our Adventure.

We are seeking your support to realise the full potential of the Longridge site by becoming a member shareholder by making a philanthropic investment in our future. This investment can be as little as £250 or as much as £100,000 and will bring you a slew of benefits as well, more importantly, safeguarding Longridge’s future, enabling us to continue to provide adventures for 80,000 children every year.

We are setting up new organisation, Longridge Activity Centre. This will be a Community Benefit Society (CBS) and will operate all activities at Longridge. Our community and friends will be able to buy shares in the society and own a piece of Longridge to help create an exciting community hub. You can click here to download our full presentation that explains why supporting Longridge now is a great idea and how you can be part of our journey.

Our Past

Longridge was from around 1926 where all the locals learned to swim, in 1946 the site was sold to the Sea Scouts, who in turn sold it to The Scout Association. In 2007, The charity Longridge On The Thames (LOTT) was formed to buy Longridge from the Scout Association and run Longridge for the whole community. In the first few years, we successfully created a year-round centre and built up good operating reserves but flooding ate into those reserves and this was compounded by the Covid enforced closures; all of which made us pause and realise we needed a new operating model for Longridge to be sustainable. The CBS is a culmination of all that we have learned, giving us the ability to involve our community in the future direction and the operational income to improve our facilities which this will allow us to provide more opportunities in the winter months and smooth out our income curve.

The Future

Longridge should always have a light touch on the earth and give young people the opportunity to enjoy and learn about our natural environment. Building large buildings that put young people inside rather defeats this objective and therefore we have moved to temporary and mobile buildings, that give some shelter but don’t take us away from the outdoors; we live by the mantra that there is never bad weather – just bad clothing! Therefore, we will be using our income to improve vital but dull things like security and parking. Whilst building adult showers/toilets, better covered catering spaces, new activities and for those that need it slightly increasing our indoor accommodation and our tented spaces. All of which we estimate will cost £1.5m, which sounds a lot but it will keep Longridge sustainable for at least 20-years, which works out as an investment of 90p per child!

How to get involved?

Being a shareowner member will allow you to rack/launch a boat at Longridge for a small additional annual fee, free parking, preferential booking and most importantly a chance to be involved in shaping the charities future. We are in the process of picking a share platform, that will be ready to go in the New Year. So in the first instance please let our CEO, Amanda Foister, know that you are interested and she will ensure you get the link first. If you have any questions, ideas or have other thoughts as to how we can realise our ambitions then also get in touch with Amanda. Amanda.foister@longridge.org.uk : 07540 411779

How can you help?

Ideas & Contacts

Do you know someone who might like to join us in creating a community hub? We know we are looking for a restaurant and a soft play, but we want to do as much as we can. What do you think Marlow needs? Who do you know that might like to get involved? Let us know.
Sponsorship

We are thinking BIG and need to raise £5m to allow Longridge to be Future Proof by replacing all of our buildings with modern structures that are built to withstand flooding, as well as being beautiful and practical. Our first aim was to raise £50k to secure planning permission, which has been achieved. Once permission has been granted, we can sail forth on fundraising for Phase One of our 5-year plan that will allow us to replace our dilapidated visitor accommodation with an inspirational, raised, modular building.
Time

We have a core salaried team who work hard but even so we wouldn’t be able to run Longridge without our dedicated volunteers. Our volunteers work in every part of our operation – we have volunteers coordinating our development planning, helping with our marketing, organising events and maintaining the site, and our Trustees all give huge amounts of their time to keep the governance of the charity tip top. For our site maintenance, some volunteers join our team regularly to plant and care for our grounds and their work is complimented by groups coming from local companies to paint, clear and repair specific areas. We always have jobs – big and small for all ages, all abilities and to fit all time scales. Longridge would not operate without volunteers.
Using Us

Probably the best way to support us is by organising your adventure at Longridge That could be on your own, with your family, a group of friends or work colleagues. And when you have a really great time, making sure you share your experience with everyone you know.