The Light Fund, the greeting card industry’s registered charity, starts the new year with refreshed branding, a brand new website and with the fruits of last year’s record-breaking fundraising – an astonishing £325,000 – being put to very good use helping men, women and children all over the world through 40 distinct charity projects, as previously announced by PG Buzz.
These include a significant two-year partnership that The Light Fund has forged with YoungMinds, the UK’s leading charity fighting for children and young people’s mental health.
Having raised significantly more money last year than ever before – largely due to the mega Bristol to Dublin cycle challenge – it was decided by The Light Fund committee to commit to a sizeable ‘legacy project’’, collectively agreeing that this should be with a charity concerned with mental health – and YoungMinds was a perfect fit.
The Light Fund’s donation of £100,000 is to fund a Helpline Adviser and training and support for two volunteers (for one day a week) for the next two years as part of the YoungMinds Parents Helpline.
The YoungMinds Parents Helpline is a national service, the only one of its kind, that offers a free and confidential service, which provides support and advice to parents and carers who are worried about the mental health, emotional wellbeing or behaviour of a child or young person aged 0-25 years.
It is estimated that through the partnership, over the next two years (to the end of 2020), The Light Fund will have helped support some 30,000 families through the Helpline.
Commenting, Emma Thomas, chief executive of YoungMinds, says: “We are delighted to form this two-year partnership with The Light Fund that will enable us to deliver a life-changing service that will empower families across the country to address their children’s mental health problems.”
Trevor Jones, chairman of The Light Fund (having now retired from Danilo) urges those working within the greeting industry, allied trades as well as on the retail side, “to make use of this invaluable service should they find themselves in a situation concerning a child or young person suffering mental health issues.”
A special logo has been devised incorporating both the YoungMinds and The Light Fund’s new branding with a view to it being used on email signoffs to help spread the word about the service.
This logo as well as more information about all the charity beneficiaries as well as The Light Fund is there in abundance on a brand new website (www.lightfund.org) that has generously been funded by Belly Button Designs, as a result of donating a percentage of sales from its Christmas card packs to the charity.
Rachel Hare, managing director of Belly Button Designs told PG Buzz that she felt “privileged to be able to help make such a difference. The Light Fund has always been a very meaningful charity for us. It is wonderful to hear of the work it is now doing with YoungMinds, with mental health issues being so prevalent.”
The new refreshed logo of The Light Fund was created by Mark Schofield, global brand director of dress-up and party company, Smiffys.
Top: YoungMinds’ Emma Thomas (3rd right) and Jo Hardy (3rd left) were delighted to be presented with the cheque from The Light Fund committee members (right-left) Ian Hyder (Max Publishing), Jakki Brown (PG/Max Publishing), Trevor Jones (formerly of Danilo) and Kelvyn Gardner (LIMA).
