Bristol Pride & ShoutOut recognised in Respect ‘Loved by You’ Awards

Bristol Pride & ShoutOut recognised in Respect ‘Loved by You’ Awards

The Bristol Pride Event, and Community Radio Show ‘ShoutOut’ have been recognised in the Co-Operative’s
Respect ‘Loved by You’ Awards 2013.

The country-wide award scheme, organised by The Co-Operative Group, generated lots of interest and 8,753 nominations were received and the awards have reached over 2.5 million people on Twitter with lots of support from community groups, celebrities and charities.

The awards were an opportunity for people from all over the UK to vote for their favourites in 27 diverse categories. Categories ranged from ‘LGBT Charity of the Year’ to ‘Inclusive Event of the Year’. We worked hard to ensure all areas of life and interests were covered in the categories, and to ensure they had a real community feel.

The Co-Operative stated that they believed the awards offered a rare opportunity for the smallest community groups and events to be celebrated alongside the biggest – “We don’t think there are enough opportunities to celebrate the inspiring work and positive impact of more isolated and community based groups, events and initiatives” said a spokesperson.

The Bristol Pride event, Run and organised by volunteers from the LGBT community, came second place in the ‘UK Pride Event of the Year’ category, only beaten by Manchester Pride.

The event which was held in July 2013 proved to be the South West’s most colourful parade & free outdoor music festival and was held in Castle Park in the City Centre. Sophie Ellis-Bextor headlined with Blue and over 40 other acts with dedicated community & family areas, bar, food concessions and market stalls.

Daryn Carter, Director of the event told PrideWest “Looking back at Pride I truly feel this was our best yet. The whole day was so exciting and I spent a lot of time rushing around but for me the highlights would have to be seeing so many people take part in the Parade, seeing so many families and children taking part in our family area and personally standing back stage watching everyone sing and dance along to Sophie Ellis-Bextor at the end of the day was incredible. Such an amazing atmosphere.”

Speaking about plans for the 2014 festival, Daryn told us “.. we have had confirmation from the Council that we can use Castle Park again and I think given the tremendous amount of feedback we have had on the site and layout change I don’t think there is too much we will change to site itself. I guess there isn’t too much else to reveal at the moment we’re just doing as much as we can to secure the event and to keep on raising the profile of Bristol and campaigning for LGBT equality. We do need some help though! As we are busy trying to raise the money to put pride on, we need people to come forward with donations or to come to fundraising events.”

Those wishing to help Bristol Pride can donate online here and people can also text donate, free of charge, by texting Bris13 £3 (an amount from £1-£5 or £10) to 70070.

Meanwhile the Community Radio Show, ShoutOut, took 3rd place in the LGBT Radio Show of the Year category.  Airing on local community stations such as BCFM, Glastonbury FM & Bradley Stoke Radio, the weekly show covers a wide range of topics relevant to the local LGBT community.