This year, Karamu Rotary marks 50 years as a club, 35 years of its annual cocktail party fundraiser, and 10 years of Advanced Plumbing as the event’s naming rights sponsor. Any one of those milestones would be worth raising a glass to. Together, they tell the story of a group of business owners and community leaders who have consistently shown up, year after year, to make Hawke’s Bay a better place.
Incoming President Angus Thomson calls it “the triple whammy.” He is not wrong. But behind the celebration is something more significant: a commitment to keep going.
“We’ve been giving back to the community since 1976,” Angus says. “The goal is to make sure we’re still doing that at our 100th. Stronger, if anything.”
Fifty years in the making
Few people can speak to Karamu Rotary’s history with more authority than Robert Griffith. A founding member in 1976 and still attending meetings today, Robert owns Grieve Diamond Jewellery in Hastings and has watched the club grow from its earliest gatherings into the organisation it is now.
For Robert, the appeal has never really changed. “It was probably the fellowship more than anything,” he says. “You go and have a beer with people from all different walks of business. I still find that’s the attraction.” He is equally enthusiastic about the calibre of speakers the club attracts. “We’ve had some fantastic speakers over the years. The quality of people who come through the door and share what they know is genuinely impressive.”
As one of the handful of original members still active in the club today, Robert is a living link between where Karamu Rotary started and where it is heading next.
Millions raised, one night at a time
Since 1976, Karamu Rotary has raised well over $2 million for the community. The engine behind that number is the annual cocktail party at Toitoi in Hastings, now in its 35th year and firmly established as one of the must-attend events on the Hawke’s Bay social calendar.
The event began as a fundraiser for the Hawke’s Bay Rescue Helicopter, when the helicopter’s spray booms had to be removed and a stretcher fitted to make rescues possible. Over its first 25 years, the cocktail party played a meaningful role in supporting that service. The beneficiary then shifted to the Hawke’s Bay Community Fitness Centre Trust, with the goal of getting young people active and off unhealthy food and screens. Most recently, the club has directed its energy toward Cranford Hospice, an organisation that touches the lives of an enormous number of Hawke’s Bay families.
Karamu Rotary has raised over $680,000 for Cranford in its partnership to date, with ambitions to reach $1 million before the campaign closes. That funding is now contributing toward a new 1.1-hectare site at 238 Havelock Road on the edge of Hastings, heading toward Havelock North. Resource consent has now been granted by Hastings District Council, a significant milestone that clears the way for construction to begin in early 2027, with the new facility expected to be open and caring for patients by Christmas 2028.
Angus says the shift to Cranford changed the fundraising dynamic completely. “After 25 years with the rescue helicopter, they had a full marketing team and our cocktail party had become a relatively small part of their overall fundraising. When we moved to Cranford, it went through the roof. It’s a cause that resonates deeply with people. Almost everyone in the room has been touched by it in some way.”
Last year alone, the club raised approximately $250,000 in total, with the cocktail party contributing the lion’s share. The charity golf tournament, now in its 25th year, added a further $28,000 to Cranford’s operating fund. Beyond that, the club runs a small weekly sunshine fund and responds to community funding applications through its website year-round.
Every dollar raised goes directly to the cause. There is no management overhead, no head office taking a cut. As Angus puts it: “What we raise is what we give.”
The event that keeps getting better
The cocktail party has evolved considerably from its standing-room-only origins. It is now a fully seated dinner with a programme built around quality auction lots, the now-legendary balloon auction, and a room of around 380 guests who turn out year after year. Previous years have featured kitchens, bathrooms, diamond rings, and high-value travel experiences as the headline auction items. The balloon auction, where every balloon contains a prize equivalent to its purchase price, reliably sells out, with the premium options going first.
Advanced Plumbing’s decade of naming rights sponsorship has been a cornerstone of the event’s growth. Director Mark Watkins came to Rotary with a personal connection to the rescue helicopter that gave the sponsorship real meaning from day one.
“My grandfather was a Rotarian,” Mark says. “For me, being part of a group of like-minded people with the ability to make a genuine difference in the community was always something I wanted to be part of. Rotary gives you the vehicle to do that.”
The connection ran deeper than most people knew. Around eight years ago, Mark fell down a cliff while hunting near Taupō, landing on his back and unable to move. The helicopter he had quietly sponsored for years flew in and brought him out. His wife Suzie, working near the base at the time, watched it fly directly over the house, fully aware it was on its way to collect her husband. After that rescue, when the opportunity came up to take on the lead sponsorship of the Karamu Rotary Cocktail Party, there was only one answer.
Mark joined Karamu Rotary because his grandfather was a lifelong Rotarian, and because when he walked through the door he found exactly his kind of people. “Individually it’s very hard to make an impact. When you’ve got a group of like-minded people and an avenue to do something, that’s where it happens.” This year marks a decade of Advanced Plumbing as lead sponsor, and the 2026 event promises to be the biggest yet.
What membership actually offers
Ask Angus what Rotary offers business owners and he will give you an honest answer rather than a polished one. “If you join wanting your business to do better, that is the wrong reason. You will just be taking, not giving back.”
What membership does offer, he says, is something more durable: fellowship, consistency, and a weekly touchpoint with a genuinely diverse group of people navigating similar pressures. The club’s roughly 45 members include lawyers, accountants, farmers, orchardists, builders, jewellers, insurers, and plumbers. In a world where business owner peer groups can be hard to find and friend groups operate on increasingly sporadic schedules, that weekly commitment has real value.
“With your own friends, lives get busy with family and work. But at Rotary, you turn up every week or whenever you can make it, you just relax and talk. If you’ve got a problem, you can discuss it with like-minded people. If you’ve got something to celebrate, they are all behind you.”
The personal development dimension is real too. The club runs a spotlight speaker format where a member gets up each week to share something they are genuinely passionate about, whether that is a business challenge, a personal journey, or a cause they care about. Angus, who by his own admission once dreaded public speaking, says the format changed his confidence fundamentally.
“You have 100% of those people in the room supporting you, whether you do a good job or a bad job. That is very different from speaking in front of strangers. It has certainly improved my ability.”
The spotlight format also builds something less obvious: genuine knowledge of the people around you. “You think you know someone, but you often only know the surface of them. When they start talking about where they have come from and what they have done, you get a whole other understanding. And through that, you see people and communities who need help, and you realise that you can actually do something about it.”
A foot in the door for newcomers
One of Rotary’s less obvious but genuinely practical benefits is what it offers people who are new to Hawke’s Bay. The region has a reputation, fair or otherwise, for being a close-knit community that can take time to break into.
Angus has seen this play out repeatedly. Members who have relocated from Auckland, Queenstown, and elsewhere have found the club gave them a way to build real relationships quickly, rather than spending years on the periphery. “These people might know one or two people in Rotary already, and they slide in really well. Otherwise, you move somewhere new and it is genuinely hard to fit into a group. Even a game of golf only takes you so far.”
Looking ahead
The club currently sits at around 45 members, with an aspiration to grow back toward 50 to 60. Rotary has modernised its expectations to reflect the reality of busy professional lives: strict weekly attendance requirements are long gone, replaced by a flexible commitment of around 60 percent participation, or meaningful contribution in other ways.
“At the end of the day, it is only about two hours out of your time a week,” Angus says. “For that, you get a great group of people, genuine connection, and the chance to be part of something that gives a quarter of a million dollars back to the community every year.”
The triple milestone is worth celebrating. But for Karamu Rotary, the more interesting number is the one still to come.
“We want to still be doing this at 100,” Angus says. “Stronger than we are now.”
For membership enquiries or to apply for community funding, visit the Karamu Rotary Club website.
