We were thrilled to celebrate our 25^th anniversary with a press conference at this year’s World Travel Market. Our Founder and Chair Fiona Jeffery OBE reflected on the amazing results we have achieved in the past 25 years, with a recap of highlights and landmarks from what has been an amazing quarter century.

 

In November 1998, Just a Drop was born on the idea of our Chair and Founder Fiona Jeffery OBE that if every attendee at World Travel Market donated £1, they would be able to raise several thousand pounds for the provision of safe water to people around the world. Hence our name ‘Just a Drop’, the idea being that no one person is too small to make a difference.

 

Fast forward 25 years and we have reached over 1.9 million people in 32 countries. Last year alone we reached 48,600 people!

 

Safe water transforms lives and for many of the communities we work with, that’s just the beginning. Over the years, Just a Drop’s work has developed to include menstrual hygiene to keep girls in school, soap making to ensure positive hygiene, income-generating loans to move people out of poverty, and sustainable agriculture, enabling people to grow crops to feed their families, and to sell the excess crops at market, helping them to escape the poverty trap. We couldn’t be prouder of everything we’ve achieved, and the lives we’ve changed, all of which relies upon the provision of safe water.

 

We could never have achieved this without the monumental, generous, and sector-wide support of the travel industry. Companies like Radisson Hotel Group, Euromonitor, Thomas Cook, and Newmarket Holidays have all played their part, with over 200 travel and tourism businesses supporting Just a Drop’s mission. At the 20^th Anniversary Just a Drop Golf Day alone, £95,000 were raised, with an incredible donation of £55,000 from Jetset’s John Bond, marking his own 55^th anniversary as a leading travel operator. This was just the latest in a long line of incredible fundraising efforts by the industry in support of Just a Drop and safe water around the world. To every single one of our sponsors, and to the entirety of the travel industry, thank you.

 

Travel companies and organisations have helped us to achieve some monumental milestones and events in our 25 years. In 1999, we launched their first disaster appeal to raise money for victims of Hurricane Mitch in Central America, and the following year did the same for the Mozambique floods. In 2010, again with the support of the travel industry, we launched ‘Just Help Haiti’ raising £180,000 and reaching thousands of people impacted by the earthquake there. By 2016, we had finished our 200^th project was completed in Makeuni County in Kenya. During 2024, we will complete our 500^th! In 2020, we reached 151,094 people with their COVID-19 response work in Kenya, Zambia, and Uganda and were awarded the Rathbones COVID-19 Response Award.

 

Without the travel industry, we couldn’t have achieved any of the amazing things we have in our 25 years, and to each and every one of you, starting with World Travel Market for their unwavering commitment to the charity in all its forms, we say thank you. We can’t wait to see what the next 25 years bring, but we are sure that they will be even more impactful than the last!