When I put together the proposal for the AA in Cornwall in 1986 the contract with the local NHS Trust made provision for us to raise corporate sponsorship. This had a great deal of potential but unfortunately the process was hi-jacked by the local NHS manager who did it all wrong and we never did get much serious interest. Had they followed the WH Smith guidelines for corporate sponsorship which were available at the time through WH Smiths the book and paper shop, they would have been pointed in the direction of professional sponsorship raisers who specialise in working with marketing people to generate the required funds.
Maybe if funds were raised under the banner of 'Civil Defence' and made available to Police and Fire/Rescue you could get some takers. My motto has always been that 50% of something is better than 100% of nothing..... and of course nothing ventured nothing gained. If I had listened to all the nay-sayers back in '86 the we would never have gotten the UK's first AA of the ground and look what happened in it's wake.
G.
