As part of promoting CPRE Derbyshire , the Countryside charity, within Derbyshire, we have attended a number of agricultural shows across the county.

Last year we attended and manned a stall at the Chatsworth Show near Bakewell, this year we decided to attend the Derbyshire County Show opposite Elvaston Castle in Erewash.Like last year, the weather was fairly mixed and the strong wind gusts would occasionally blow some of our leaflets away, but that did not dishearten us.

We were sited with similar charity stalls at the Chatsworth show in 2024?which led to better conversations with members and the general public, but it rained very heavily at times which led to a lot of people disappearing to find shelter.

In 2025 we were sited randomly next to the dog show area at the Derbyshire County Show and people in that location were primarily interested in showing their dogs off or looking at their children’s dogs on display.

The location was not ideal and we were very much sited on a thoroughfare rather than a browsing area.

The one success we did have was being able to put up and take down our new CPRE Gazebo, despite the strong winds and this will be a useful asset to supporting events going forward.

We concluded that these larger agricultural shows are probably not the best places to promote our charity and for future events we will look to promote ourselves at indoor shows and fetes, where there is more people to talk directly to.

In 2026, we will be running a programme of events to celebrate our centenary and there will be plenty of opportunity to use our CPRE Derbyshire gazebo.