The rewards of the job are some little anecdotes. Marco Bode spoke to a fan who had been supporting since 1965. Philipp Bargfrede spoke to a friend in the community. Marco Friedl’s is sometimes hung up on because they think it is a late April Fool’s joke. But everything works smoothly. The campaign met with 100% approval. “In my calls, I found that the people are very grateful and are happy just to be asked if they need our support,” Said Dr. Hess-Grunewald.
Werder Bremen has about 1,800 ticket members and supporters over the age of 70. More than 1000 of them are local to the Bremen area. “We specifically want to find those who are having problems so we can help solve them. Most of them are fine, and are being looked after by their families or by the neighbourhood. But if there are people in need, we might be able to locate them, and help them directly or indirectly, which fulfils the purpose of our campaign,” explains Henrik Oesau from Werder’s CSR department, which handles all of this information. “Discussions with the Bremen Volunteer Agency and the Bremen Neighbourhood Aid networks have shown that many people apply to help out, but it’s difficult to get to those in need. With this campaign we are trying to overcome this challenge.”