ON behalf of myself and the members of the Hereford in Bloom Committee, I wish to make an apology to your readers because we are going to fail to meet our objectives this winter.

As most people are aware, we took over responsibility for providing all the annual flowers in the city this year and with the help of our sponsors, I think we had an excellent show, achieving Gold at the RHS Britain in Bloom Awards ceremony in Shrewsbury.

This is also our first year as a registered charity and until we can build up our reserves sufficiently, we have to restrict some of our buying. So this means that, for this winter only, we are going to have to leave some beds empty, but next summer as our cash flow kicks in we will have no problem in providing a display similar to this year and including the following winter as well.

Currently to help our cash flow people can help us by going to our website – www.herefordinbloom.com – and becoming a friend of Hereford in Bloom to win an excellent prize next July during the 300th anniversary of the Three Choirs Festival here in Hereford.

Our plans for next year are well advanced and with your help we will make it an excellent year.

TREVOR SWINDELLS Chairman, Hereford in Bloom