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By Kirsty, March 27, 2012 5:17 pm

Our Virgin London Marathon runner Adam Fleetwood joined another 10,000 people at Silverstone Grand Prix circuit earlier this month for the annual ‘Adidas Silverstone Half Marathon’ as part of his training. Glorious sunshine, new trainers, some leg supports and plenty of carbs allowed Adam to finish the 13.1 mile slog in 1 hour and 46 minutes!

“Training is going well and the Silverstone half really helped me concentrate on pace and distance, it was great for getting in some extra miles too. We even got a shout out on Heart FM for Virgin Balloon Flights! I was pleased with my finish time and am hoping to keep a similar pace at the marathon which is just three and a half weeks away.”

Sponsorship is on the up and Adam has now sold all three spots on his running vest to local businesses Willows Dental, Team Support and Telling Architects bringing his current fundraising for Birmingham Children’s Hospital over the £2000 mark – yippee!

Of course there is still time to sponsor Adam on his Virgin Money Giving Page before the big day on April 22^nd.

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By Kirsty, March 5, 2012 12:41 pm

Here is the latest blog update from Virgin Balloon Flights runner, freelance designer Adam Fleetwood.

“I’m pleased to say that sponsorship for the Virgin London Marathon is rolling in nicely, friends, family, Virgin Balloon Flights colleagues and local businesses are all making kind donations which is fantastic.

I’ve recently been selling sponsorship space on my Virgin Unite running vest and two of my very generous customers, Willows Dental (£200) and Telling Architects (£100) have taken two of the three spaces which has really helped me get close to my target of £2000.00. I’m currently at £1921.25 including gift aid.

There is still one last space on my running vest for any company that wishes to get some great exposure and at the same time give to a great cause. If you’re interested or know anyone that might be, please get in touch at wotsitdesign@gmail.com or call 07970 821266.

Please help me keep the donations rolling in for Birmingham Children’s Hospital. It will make running the 26.2 miles all the more worthwhile!

To make a donation visit my Virgin Money Giving Sponsorship page.

Thank you

Adam x”

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By Kirsty, February 27, 2012 12:40 pm

Virgin London Marathon together with Virgin Money Giving have teamed up to create a bit of fun for Marathon runners in the form of Marathon News TV.

Last week runners of the marathon were sent a link to create a news piece simply by filling in their details, such fun! Being a good sport, Virgin Balloon Flights marathon runner, freelance designer Adam Fleetwood got his three minutes of fame, which you can watch by following this link:

http://www.marathonnewstv.com/?f=Adam%20&l=Fleetwood&v=AdamFleetwood&ch=Virgin%20Unite&n=1

You can help support our chosen charity Birmingham Children’s Hospital by sponsoring Adam on his Virgin Money Giving Page, every penny counts! You can also keep up to date with his training and fundraising on our blog.

Virgin Balloon Flights fly from over 100 launch sites in England, Scotland and Wales from as little as £89 per person, for further information, please call 0844 8448080 or visit virginballoonflights.co.uk

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By Kirsty, February 23, 2012 6:16 pm

As part of our Green Office Plan, we here at Virgin Balloon Flights have been thinking of ways to make our lovely red company a little greener.

In our monthly internal newsletter we asked staff for easy ideas to make our business more sustainable. We had some super inventive ideas including one from Customer Service Representative Carrie-Ann Starling, who suggested we use white boards rather than notepads for our call centre staff – ingenious!!

Our shiny new white boards will save us around 150 notepads a year, that’s a huge 7,500gms of paper. Further suggestions have included bicycle parks and a car share scheme which we hope to implement in the near future.

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By Kirsty, February 20, 2012 5:27 pm

Virgin Balloon Flights have a speedy runner set to take on the 26.2 mile world famous challenge on April 22^nd this year, all in aid of Birmingham Children’s Hospital.

Adam Fleetwood, freelance creative designer to Virgin Balloon Flights jumped at the chance of applying for one of Virgin Unite’s London Marathon places late last year. After some careful consideration of how to win over the votes at Virgin, Adam put together a short movie, which you can watch on YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sx2UjRQyeI

After being granted a place (yippee), Adam set his mind to training, fundraising and a bit of blogging along the way to keep us all up to date with what he’s doing. There are a number of blogs up already, just click the image below to take you to the page and find out what’s been going on.

TRAINING BEGINS!

STEPPING IT UP

BURNING OFF THE TURKEY

TAKING TRAINING TO NEW HEIGHTS

BIRMINGHAM CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL VISIT

With Adams efforts and an auction held by Virgin Balloon Flights at the Christmas party, we’re well on the way to hitting our £2000 target. Already we have reached a whopping £1733.75 including Gift Aid! You too can help us reach our target by sponsoring Adam via his Virgin Money Giving page: http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/fundraiser-web/fundraiser/showFundraiserProfilePage.action?userUrl=AdamFleetwood

As always, our lovely big red balloons will be at the start line of 2012’s Virgin London Marathon, so be sure to give us a wave if you see us!

Take to the skies with Virgin Balloon Flights from over 100 launch sites in England, Scotland and Wales from as little as £89pp.

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By Kirsty, December 15, 2011 6:42 pm

“As the Virgin Unite Insider for Virgin Balloon Flights, the opportunities to use ‘business as a force for good’ are endless. When the chance of going to South Africa with Sir Richard Branson and his connection trip guests came my way courtesy of Virgin Unite, of course I grabbed it by the (Buffalo) horns and got packing!

A jam packed schedule allowed me to meet some of the most inspiring, motivated and dedicated people I’ve met in my lifetime; The Branson Centre Entrepreneurs, Jean Oelwang (The CEO of Virgin Unite), Dr Taddy Blecher (a pioneer of the free education movement in South Africa) and of course Sir Richard himself alongside his business mogul guests.

After a long flight with the superb Virgin Atlantic, a hotel check in and a stimulating meet and greet, I accompanied Jean, the connection trip guests and the Virgin Unite team to Newtown arriving at the Sophiatown Restaurant where we were delighted by African cuisine and guest speaker Dr Taddy Blecher. Post lunch we marvelled at Inner City Craft Initiatives and met ‘Prince’ an up and coming South African jeweller who designed & created the most interesting pieces of ‘junk’ jewellery. Who can resist a bracelet made out of a fork?!

From here we crossed townships to Constitution Hill. By far one of Johannesburg’s most moving sights. Originally a fort during the Boer War it later became an infamous prison housing many of South Africa’s most well-known resistance leaders and is now home to the Constitutional Court of South Africa. After a quick change we headed off to the Orient Restaurant and chatted over exquisite Chinese food before listening to more inspiring guest speakers.

Early the next morning guests enjoyed breakfast with Sir Richard before we travelled to Mzansi Designers Studio to meet Lesego Malatsi (a previous Branson centre entrepreneur) and saw his fashion house in full swing. We were later treated to seeing his first boutique shop in Maponya Mall too. We also experienced another previous Branson Centre entrepreneurs thriving business in Diepkloof, Soweto. A recycling plant started by Tshepo Nawane.

Inspired once more by the sheer determination and drive to create employment for local communities and to start businesses from scratch, we chatted to both Lesego and Tshepo en route to the grand opening of the Virgin Active Gym in Maponya. Greeted with steel drums, stilt walkers and Sir Richard, this feast of colour and sound gave the gym opening the atmosphere it most definitely deserved.

Departing the swanky new gym we lunched at Velo and chatted with Marious Minnie, the CEO of Southpoint and a partner and investor of the Branson Centre (BC) before crossing over to the BC to offer mentoring to the current entrepreneurs.

The pièce de résistance of the day was of course the Screw Business As Usual booklaunch at ‘Randlords’ where Richard spoke about his book alongside African children’s choirs and pure cultured entertainment. You can see my video montage of the #SBAU book launch here on our YouTube page.

After supper and wine back at the hotel with Richard and guests, it was off to bed before an early start to wave off the guests, Richard and Jean to Ulusaba for the next step of their trip. You can see Richards Blog about their game drive here. I spent my last day in South Africa with some of the Virgin Media Pioneers sightseeing and taking in some of South Africa’s most beautiful animals.

THANK YOU to Virgin Unite, Sir Richard, Jean and the rest of the team for the most amazing experience of my life. A trip I will treasure in my heart forever.”

Kirsty x

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By Eve, November 17, 2011 4:55 pm

The 16^th November 2011 saw the first ever global Virgin Social Marathon, a groundbreaking event that took place around the world bringing together all sorts of digital types from Virgin offices near and far all working together for a day-long event at the Facebook office in London. Starting in Australia, then over to the UK and South Africa and finally ending in LA, California at Sir Richard Branson, Eve Branson and Virgin Unite’s event Rock the Kasbah.

The aim of the day was to reach out to our fans and followers across all of our social media channels including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google+ with the theme and hashtag #FirstTimes. A fun packed and fast-typing day, we started posting and tweeting in the UK at around 6am and continued through until almost midnight.

With Mini Draws of lots of Virgin goodies up for grabs plus a Grand Prize including 2 hot air balloon rides, an Aston Martin experience day, a 1 year membership to Virgin Active, a Virgin London Marathon place and a Virgin Media TiVo box to name but a few, getting all of our social media fans entering and playing with the brand new app Virgin First Times was great fun.

In keeping with the theme #FirstTimes and to mark the the launch of the new app, we asked some of our colleagues here in the Virgin Balloon Flights office to share their ballooning first times with us.

“Describe your first balloon ride in three words?”

“What did you think of your first balloon ride?”

First Timers

We also wanted to know what our colleagues have been up to for the first time lately – here are some of their firsts:-

“Became a Dad” – Alex F, “Produced work for my very first public exhibition” – Ben H “Saw Bruno Mars in concert”- Sophie E “Bought my first home with my fiancé” – Caz S “Attended a Management Board meeting” – Ryan L “Skydive!” 10,000ft of pure nerves” – Liz M “Planning a Vegas wedding. Won a comp to go to SA with @RichardBranson” – Kirsty M

If you fancy flying in a balloon for the first time, please visit our Experience page where you can learn all about what’s involved on a Virgin Balloon Flights ballooning adventure.

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By Alex, November 14, 2011 2:02 pm

Well, my challenge to do 50 First Times in Five Days for Virgin Unite leading up to the Virgin Social Marathon on Wednesday (Nov 16) is underway.

So far, I’ve been hit with a custard pie (watch this on YouTube), learned some Swedish, had a family photo shoot, made pasta from scratch and rewired a light switch (with supervision from an electrician!) all for the very first time. But this is just the start – there’s a long way to go.

Next it’s a 10-mile run followed by a refreshing ice bath! Having my legs waxed and eating a banana split will be a doddle after that.

Follow my progress on Twitter, on Facebook and sponsor me on my Virgin Money Giving Page.