A man from Edinburgh gave children an early Christmas present at Sick Kids Hospital, collected £ 7,000 worth of toys and arranged a motorcade of over 30 supercars to visit over the weekend.
Mark Cunningham runs his own mobile car service company and has made it his mission to raise funds for Sick Kids’ new facility in the Royal Infirmary Edinburgh on Sunday while organizing some of the fastest cars in the world.
The whole aim of this generous fundraising campaign was to put a smile on people’s faces in the run-up to Christmas and to collect as many toys as possible that can be distributed to hundreds of children.
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In addition to raising £ 7,000 in toy donations and organizing supercars to surprise the kids, Mark has raised nearly £ 1,500 on a donation page and will receive a special certificate from the hospital for his efforts.
Cunningham, 26, of Corstorphine said, “I was just telling customers about the event and setting up the give page, and things have gone a little crazy over the past week. In the past week we have received an insane amount of toys that are worth around £ 7000.
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“I just went out last weekend and washed up for a toy, I didn’t even take money from people, I just asked to donate a toy instead. My customers just gave me tons of stuff. A really good one My client donated a whole range of toys and another gave me £ 500 for the fundraiser. “
Mark, who now runs his own valet company MMC Mobile Valeting, had previously worked with Aston Martin and therefore used the contacts he had built up over the years at AutoBahn Scotland to bring some of the fastest and most expensive cars in the world for the children to look at and indoors sit.
There were a total of 34 cars in the hospital on Sunday, including mostly Aston Martin, Porsche, Lamborghini and Ferrari.
Mark continued, “We just rocked the hospital and all the kids came out to see the cars, we got some crazy looks for driving all these cars to the hospital, but they absolutely loved it.
Even some of the adults were amazed at the cars on display.
“I organized it and got Motorway Scotland involved who are the supercar team that I sponsor and they helped organize all of the cars to come. It was such a good turnout, we had people from Glasgow, Stirling and Dumblane who only came in their cars ”and they all either brought toys or donated money.
“Things have changed, I’ve had people who couldn’t and of course I knew that everything wasn’t going to go according to plan with Covid, but it actually turned out better than I thought. You’re talking about five million pound cars. “Turn up so you can’t ask for much more.”
Mark added that while everyone had to keep their distance and not everyone could sit in the car, it more than enriched each day and put a smile on their faces. He also revealed future plans to get some kids out for a ride in the cars whenever it’s safe.
Mark was grateful that the fundraiser was carried out despite the Covid guidelines and that there was an impressive turnout.
He added: “Fiona, the woman from the infirmary, actually said she had never seen such an impressive number of cars and decided to bring down her own son to surprise him too.
“People asked what I should give, money or toys, and I always said toys. You can’t give it away with money, at least with the toys it showed how much effort I and others have made to be able to provide the children with something for Christmas that may not have many families or people around .
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“That made me feel good about handing over the toys. The kids wake up with something on Christmas Day and that’s all that matters. The toys that they had duplicates of they wanted to send to the Christmas Roll Call mission that Forth runs and helps them too. “
