Children in Need always brings out the creative side in solicitors (and the slightly unpleasant, to recall last year's sponsored cat-food eater), and this year was no exception.

Staff at Shropshire firm Lanyon Bowdler held a 1970s disco and paid to wear the clothes they so successfully dragged up from the bottom of their wardrobes (still there presumably in the unshakeable belief that it's going to come back into fashion eventually).

They raised 600.

Meanwhile, Bolton firm Keoghs filled up a meeting room with 300 balloons, some of which contained nice prizes donated by a host of suppliers and contacts.

Staff had to pay a minimum of 2.50 to pop a balloon, while chief executive Paul Smith raised more than 500 in sponsorship by spending the day 'back on the shop floor', opening the post, manning the switchboard and so on (which is surely good practice anyway).

Pictured are receptionists (back row, from left) Pat Tyldesley, whose idea the balloons were, and Katherine Williams, and (front row) Tracey Hamblet and Sharon Davies.

[This article refers to images that appear in the printed edition (see [2003] Gazette, 4 December, 11)]