VOLUNTEERS have raised a record amount of nearly £50,000 for charity after running a Christmas card shop for seven weeks.Woodbridge Round Table took £48,300 when it set up the shop in the Thoroughfare, Woodbridge, and this was a rise of £4,300 compared with the previous year.

VOLUNTEERS have raised a record amount of nearly £50,000 for charity after running a Christmas card shop for seven weeks.

Woodbridge Round Table took £48,300 when it set up the shop in the Thoroughfare, Woodbridge, and this was a rise of £4,300 compared with the previous year.

Round Tabler and shop organiser Roger Parker said: ''We enjoyed fantastic support once again for the Charity Christmas Card Shop in Woodbridge. This year we sold over £48,000 of cards for 27 different charities. The card shop is a major source of income for many of the local charities we support.

''Many thanks are due to the helpers in the shop and to everybody who has supported us over the years.''

Nearly all the money raised will be given to the charities and Round Table takes a small percentage to hand out to deserving causes in the town.

In the last nine years the shop has raised more than £250,000 although the history stretches back to 1966 when it was first started by Frank Bennett, of Ipswich Road, Woodbridge.

Mr Bennett said: ''That first year we raised about £600 and all of it went to the charities concerned. To equate that £600 with today's money is difficult but not impossible."

Mr Bennett said it was possible that more than £500,000 has been raised from the sale of cards since 1966. He added that there was scope for the shop to expand by supplying cards for companies to send out at Christmas.