We came third in a vote by PR professionals. Others in the top five were the Olympic Games, soft drinks brand Red Bull, the Paralympics and the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.
Of course, this success would not have been possible without a team effort across the business. Engineers from our supplier Romec worked tirelessly to paint postboxes gold for every London 2012 home-grown champion.
Last week postal affairs minister Jo Swinson unveiled a plaque on our gold postbox opposite Westminster Abbey. This is starting the programme whereby all gold postboxes will remain permanently gold.
Jo Swinson tweeted: 'Delighted to launch @RoyalMailNews plan to make the gold postboxes permanent!’ This was retweeted six times.
We’re still celebrating home athletes’ performances at the London 2012 Games! How? By adding plaques to our gold postboxes so everyone knows which athlete is associated with each box.
We announced in the autumn that all our gold boxes – painted to celebrate each Team GB and Paralympics gold medal-winning athlete – would stay that way.
Britain’s four-time Paralympic cycling champion at London 2012 became Dame Sarah Storey in the New Year’s Honours List. It caps a ‘perfect’ year after she announced earlier this month that she was expecting her first baby.
Sarah is a huge fan of her gold medal stamps and gold postboxes. Earlier this year she invited RMTV to join her as she cycled between each of her four gold postboxes. At London 2012, she equalled Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson’s British record of 11 Paralympic gold medals.
Canoeist Etienne, from Bedford, won gold at the London 2012 games. He dropped in to meet staff at the Carlisle mail centre to see first hand the extra effort put in by Royal Mail workers in the run up to Christmas.
None other than chancellor of the exchequer, George Osborne, helped paint a gold postbox to celebrate the achievements of Paralympain Craig MacLean and Olympian Victoria Pendleton, who live is his constituency, Wilmslow.
Victoria was unable to attend due to her training commitments with Strictly Come Dancing.
But Craig (pictured) attended with his family, and they were joined unexpectedly by a large group of local school children, and a number of curious shoppers.
Approval
Since our announcement on Friday that the gold postboxes will be staying gold permanently, the athletes and media have gone crazy for our news.
Online coverage continues to feature on websites across the UK, while there have been more than 50 tweets on Twitter in the past 24 hours.
Wilmslow gold postbox
We painted a postbox gold on Friday outside of Tesco Express on Alderley Road, Wilmslow. This was to celebrate the gold medal wins of cyclists Craig MacLean and Victoria Pendleton.
Press
The story appears on the websites and print versions of a number of national newspapers, including The Guardian, The Independent and the Daily Record.
We painted 110 boxes gold across the UK in the hometowns of the victorious London 2012 athletes. The most northerly was in Lossiemouth, Scotland, for Heather Stanning, while the most southerly was for her rowing partner Helen Glover, in Penzance. Each box will have a plaque with the athlete’s name on.
Golden thank yous
Here’s a selection of their quotes:
The postboxes we painted over the summer to celebrate the gold medal triumphs of Team GB and ParalympicsGB will be remaining gold permanently.
We painted 110 boxes across the UK in the hometowns of the victorious London 2012 athletes, with the most northerly in Lossiemouth, Scotland, painted to celebrate Heather Stanning’s rowing victory with partner Helen Glover. Helen’s post box, in Penzance, is actually the most southerly location. The two boxes were the first painted by Royal Mail after Heather and Helen became the first gold medallists of the summer.
