A Day At Holland Park – Corporate Volunteer Day 2022

For our annual corporate volunteer day, members of the Mer public charging team visited Holland Park in October and spent the day in the Park’s woodlands.

volunteer day

Holland Park is the largest park in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, boasting 22.5 hectares of beautiful gardens, woodland areas, play facilities, a café, and more. The Park is the base of the borough’s Ecology Service. Their Ecology Centre runs events, activities and educational visits and workshops for schools. It is also the home of Kyoto Garden, a Japanese garden that was donated by the Chamber of Commerce of Kyoto in 1991.

Stephanie Salguero, Head of Marketing and Sustainability Manager at Mer UK, organised the corporate volunteer day. “As part of our sustainable objectives, we wanted our employees to feel a connection with the subject. Our yearly corporate volunteer day out does just that. Not only are we helping out a charity for the day, we are also taking this as a team building experience. This year, we helped a charity keep green spaces clean and welcoming to the wildlife and visitors.’

The day was organised in collaboration with HandsOn London, a volunteering charity that specialises in engaging individuals in volunteering programmes and aims to increase access for families in confined spaces, schools, community and exercise groups, dog walkers and tourists. Jessica Hughes, Project and Volunteer Coordinator at HandsOn London, spoke of the impact companies make during their corporate volunteer day and the sense of achievement it offers individuals. “It is really great to see people making such a difference. It is nice to see that people enjoy it so much and realise that it is a really easy thing to get involved with. When they get to the end of the day and they see the difference they have made, it is so nice to see how pleased they are.”

Over the course of the day, we were tasked with cutting and removing brambles from an area of woodland in the Park and gathering them into container bags. Our work contributed to the upkeep of the area, ensuring it does not get overgrown so that visitors can continue to enjoy the space. Our sustainable volunteering project provided a chance to work collectively and solidify our teamwork skills, and appreciate how our company’s passion for sustainability and environmental protection goes beyond our work in the electric mobility sector.

Gerry Kelsey, Community and Training Manager at Holland Park, spoke of the benefits of getting outdoors and engaging with nature. “Conservation volunteering has a lot of psychological benefits. For mental wellbeing, it is really important, and also it is very good for relationship forming as well, especially when you are used to an environment. It takes you out of your comfort zone into a different zone, you learn more from each other just by being together and doing a task that is different.”

Members of the Mer team found the day rewarding and enjoyable.

‘It has been a great day in Holland Park. Working with the rest of the Mer team has been really great; getting our hands stuck in and talking to each other in a much more constructive way.’ – Bhavish Ruparelia, Senior Business Analyst.
‘It was wonderful to play a small role in the preservation and cultivation of Holland Park’s beautiful woodland and work with my colleagues to deliver a shared goal today.’ – Isabelle Osborne, Content Lead.

We are looking forward to our corporate volunteer day in 2023.