Dementia charity to renovate Stockport day care centre after musicMagpie donation

A long-running demential charity is improving its Bredbury day care centre after receiving a £10,000 donation from Stockport-based circular economy pioneer, musicMagpie.

Employees from the tech reseller raised the money after choosing The Weekend Day Centre to be its ‘charity of the year’ for 2025.

Based in Bredbury, less than two miles from musicMagpie’s head office, The Weekend Day Centre has been helping local people with dementia for the past 34 years.

Stockport Council currently own the building, which is visited by 140 people each week, but this is set to be taken over by the charity before the end of the year. The money raised by musicMagpie will now go towards replacing the central heating system and renovating the centre’s kitchen.  

The Weekend Day Centre manager Jo Davies said:

“We’ve already spent quite a lot of money on the building over the past five years, but we didn’t want to go crazy because we didn’t own it.

“The heating system in there is about 50 years old – the boiler sounds like the TARDIS from Doctor Who when it fires up – so it will be good to get that sorted.

“We’re looking to improve the kitchen and a few other bits as well and this money from musicMagpie will be a huge help towards that.”

Management accountant Ash Ramsden has worked at musicMagpie for 16 years and has been leading the company’s fundraising efforts. The most recent challenge saw employees cycle 4,000km on an exercise bike at the Stockport headquarters. He said:

“Since starting our charity of the year initiative in 2023, we’ve managed to raise more than £30,000 for three brilliant local charities.

“Not only is The Weekend Day Centre close to home for us but it’s also close to my heart, as my nan lived with dementia for several years, so it just seemed like a great fit.

“£10k was our initial goal for this year so we’re delighted to have hit that but we’re still fundraising until March 2026, so we’re hoping we can double that total by then.”