Posted:  Tuesday 16 February 2010

South East Associates
Wentworth Lunch

- Wednesday 20th January -

Our 10th annual Associates Lunch was held at the Wentworth Golf Club on January 20th.  Despite having only just recovered from lots of snow, and with the beginnings of a blizzard chasing us into the venue, 81 Associates, spouses/partners, and guests, assembled in the Members’ Lounge for a pre-lunch drink.
Since our main aim is to involve as many Associates as possible, to help them stay connected to each other, fit and active; this – our biggest event of the year - is so important.  We were delighted with the attendance of a record 81 Associates, spouses and partners and guests.

Our guests this year we were delighted to welcome Geraldine Huse, General Manager of CBD UK & Ireland and Kirstie Hawkes, the UK Sustainability Manager.
Before lunch, Geraldine gave us a fascinating insight into how the retail trade and P&G were dealing with the ‘crunch’ and the proliferation of cheap store brands through creative promotions and tiered product options.
A brief update on the state of the business in the UK, showed that it is still doing well.  The UK remains one of the strongest businesses in the P&G world.

Geraldine Huse - dealing with the 'crunch'

As usual, our lunch, service, and the ambiance were excellent.
Cherry & Peter Nel helped Sue and I in the arduous task of ensuring the food was up to the standard expected by the Associates, by previously tasting our way through the Wentworth menu.  Such are the burdens of office.

Over coffee, I reminded everyone of what we did in 2009 - 25 events including two away breaks - Galway in May and Derbyshire in September; well attended pub lunches and the summer lunch at Odiham; monthly walks all over Berkshire, Surrey and Hampshire; a boat trip up the Thames; visits to the BBC, the Weald & Downland Museum, Highclere House, the Watercress Line preserved railway, ten-pin bowling at Bracknell and a Golf Tournament at Burhill; completed a busy roster for the year.

In 2010 we again plan 25 events, including in addition to the usual walking, heritage and golf events; two away breaks to Dorset and Warwick/Stratford.
In good P&G style, we are re-branding our pub lunches so that we will now offer four lunches per year: in addition to Wentworth (our ‘Winter lunch’) and the Odiham ‘Summer’ lunch, we will now offer ‘Spring’ and ‘Autumn’ lunches!
We hope to repeat the success of last year’s boat trip, with another – this time down the Thames from Westminster.
A new idea – a one-night away, heritage break is planned to take us to two grand National Trust properties in Wiltshire & Somerset (Stourhead & Tyntesfield).

Over coffee, Kirstie Hawkes told us of P&G’s award winning sustainability work – from designing sustainability into our products, to the ‘live, learn and thrive’ strategy which is improving lives for millions of children throughout the world and saving thousands of lives, particularly through the Children’s Safe Drinking Water work with our PUR product.
Kirstie talked about the Company’s most recent efforts in Haiti where (to-date), sufficient PUR has been provided to create 60 million litres of clean water and
$1.2 million of donated product.
She introduced the Company’s matched contribution plan, which to-date has raised over $2 million from employees, Associates/retirees and the Company.

Before everyone departed, we enjoyed a ten-minute slide show of the events of the past ten years of Associates activities.  This can be viewed on YouTube!!! 

A great afternoon was enjoyed by all.  Even the snow cooperated, allowing us a safe journey home!

Kevin Williams

(ph  16/02/2010)

« Back to News