Customers at Fiveways Co-op, Burnham on Crouch have given Burnham Lifeboat Stations Floating Boathouse Appeal a much needed boost recently.

Staff members dressed up in fancy dress for a whole weekend to help raise funds for the appeal and there were prizes for the best costumes on both the Saturday and Sunday.

Meg Crawford, Co-op staff member and organiser of the event said “The theme for the weekend was ‘The Night the Ship went Down’ and the staff hoped to raise £1,000 towards the appeal. In the end we smashed our target and collected £1,485 all due to the generosity of the customers at the Co-op!

Burnham RNLI is trying to raise £130,000 towards a new floating boathouse which will house the new Atlantic 85 Lifeboat due on station in 2011.

Claire Rawlinson, Volunteer Assistant Lifeboat Press Officer said “We were thrilled that the staff members at the Co-op wanted to help us towards reaching our target of £130,000 for the new floating boathouse. We have received tremendous support from the local community in what has been an extremely busy and difficult year for our volunteer crews. It’s great to know that the efforts the crew put in without question, whenever they’re needed are appreciated by so many people.”