An Army of Artists Join Forces for the RSPCA

Local artist, Kate Gabriel has been a supporter of her local RSPCA branch in Great Yarmouth for a long time. When the opportunity came up to support them further, Kate jumped at the chance! Brewers Great Yarmouth donated a wide range of glosses from Albany, Crown and Johnstone's and plenty of sundries to help with the project.

“I’ve long been a supporter of the East Norfolk branch of the RSPCA, based in Great Yarmouth, having previously adopted three wonky black cats from them. I’m also an artist living locally in Ludham so Treasurer, Jill Brenkley, sent me an email asking if I’d help renovate some old collection boxes they had found when clearing out a shed.” said Kate.

The branch is planning on extending the clinic in Tar Works Road over the next few years to offer more of a service to the local community. The goal is to create a surgery that can carry out minor procedures for animals in-house to keep costs down for the branch and clients. There will be lots of fundraising to help towards the goal. They found the old collection boxes hiding in an old shed at the clinic and thought if they could be brought back to life, this would be a great way to start fundraising.

“It turned out there were nine of these life-sized animal collection boxes: 7 dogs, some with puppies attached, a koala and a penguin! I thought 'crikey, I’m going to need help here!' So, I put out a request for help to my artist friends on Facebook to recruit volunteers. I organised a small army that was raring to paint them.” exclaimed Kate.

Kate continues: “I had just seen a Brewers advertisement on Facebook and thought 'Mmm paint, we'll need paint!' So sent a message and they were brilliant, putting me in touch with Callum at your Great Yarmouth store. He was just fantastic, invited me in and found some tins, brushes and wipes we used.”

We hope these transformed collection boxes will be a great source of income for the RSPCA!