We realise most people are incredibly busy nowadays, and committing to turn up regularly may be a serious difficulty.
Obviously our regular volunteers do have to skip sessions sometimes too when they need to fit in vets' appointments, holidays and so on (we're not slave drivers!)
If you think you can probably only manage to volunteer occasionally, there are still lots of useful things you can get involved with.
Shops
We need the regular volunteers to make it possible to stay open at the advertised times, but there are plenty of back-room tasks which can be started or stopped depending on the number of helpers available.
Behind the person at the till there is a busy team who sort, clean, price and shelve. If they can stack up plenty of items all priced and ready on days when many volunteers are available, one helper can keep up with the shelf-filling when we're short-staffed.
Extra helpers on a Sunday, when sales are comparatively slow, can really benefit the following weekdays by making it possible for Monday to open fully stocked and looking good.
RSPCA Week
We normally average over £20 per volunteer per hour for this collection, which comes round at the end of April each year. If you don't have time to do anything else in the year, just two hours volunteering would mean £40 we wouldn't otherwise have.
One-off stalls and events
Individual jumble, car-boot or table-top sales can raise useful amounts, although they need a fair bit of organisation and some way of transporting sales items.
Annual Dog Show
We need a team of people for the basic organisation, but there are plenty of useful things that can be done on the day itself if you don't have time to come to any pre-planning meetings.
If you might be interested, email info@rspca-cambridge.org.uk
