'I started crying'- dedicated Derian House volunteers from Garstang win big at charity's raffle

A Garstang couple who bought a raffle ticket while volunteering for Derian House Children's Hospice have won the top prize in the charity's Summer Raffle.

Jeanette and Dave Mullin were lending a hand at the charity’s Colour Run event in June when they decided to buy a £1 ticket.

Just a few weeks later, on Friday, July 17, the couple received the phone call – they'd won the jackpot prize of £5000.

The win marks the second big prize for Derian House supporters in just a few days, after another lucky supporter scooped the hospice's lottery rollover jackpot earlier in the week.

Jeanette said: "I had to hand the phone to Dave because I started crying. I've never had a phone call like that in my life. You just don't expect it. I thought it was a wind-up!”

£1,000 was awarded to the second prize winner, £500 to the third prize winner, and 20 runners-up won prizes of £25 in the raffle that ran from April to July.

With entries coming in from as far as Cornwall and Scotland, the raffle launched by the Chorley children’s hospice sold 18,884 tickets – raising £35,357 for the charity’s children and young adults.

And it wasn’t just ticket sales that boosted the total; the charity was inundated with donations from kind-hearted supporters that amounted to £16,354.

Winners of the top prize Jeanette and Dave Mullin are dedicated supporters of Derian House, and have taken part in the hospice's Morecambe Bay Walk, regularly support the charity through its lottery and raffle, and Dave even handcrafted a poker table for the Derian Dads group to enjoy.

Jeanette said: "We love to support Derian House and everything they do.

“It's a fantastic charity. Volunteering and taking part in events is no problem for us because we genuinely have fun and enjoy it. You don't realise how lucky you are until you hear other people's stories. You never know what's around the corner, so I think it's important to give something back. I'm still in shock that we won – it feels so surreal.”

Later this year, Dave will also take on Derian House's first overseas fundraising challenge – trekking across the Sahara Desert to raise even more money for the hospice.

"We're going to put £500 back into Dave's Sahara Desert Trek fundraising for Derian House,” said Jeanette.

“And after that, I think we will use our winnings to give our daughter a treat, and put the rest towards the holiday of a lifetime exploring Utah's Route 95. We are both semi-retired, so we’re making sure to get more adventures in – and this will definitely be going towards that.”

Sarah Proctor, Lottery and Regular Giving Manager at Derian House Children’s Hospice, said: "We were absolutely delighted to tell Jeanette and Dave they'd won our top prize. The fact they've already decided to donate £500 of their winnings back to the hospice sums up the kind of people they are. They are such fantastic supporters of Derian House and we couldn’t be happier for them.

“The amount of money raised in the Derian House summer raffle will make a real difference to seriously ill children and young people from across the North West. It will cost £6 million to run Derian House this year and we rely heavily on the generosity of our supporters as we only receive a small amount of this in NHS funding.”

For full terms and conditions of the raffle visit: https://www.derianraffle.co.uk/terms-conditions/