This summer, Boots UK will be inviting Nottingham City kids to join its high-impact and high-energy ‘Feel Good Club’.
The summer club will be run by Boots UK in partnership with Nottingham Forest in the Community at the new Forest Sports Zone to help improve the opportunities in sports for children living in Nottingham City.
Offering sports activities for children and their families, the free club will be full of easy to access sports, fun and games for all the family, with the main target group being children aged five – 11 of all skills and abilities.
Oonagh Turnbull, Senior CSR Manager at Boots UK and Trustee for the Boots Charitable Trust, comments: “Encouraging children from an early age to get involved with, and enjoy sports is so important, not only for their health and wellbeing, but also because sports play a really important role in helping to grow children’s confidence and self-esteem. The Feel Good Club has been built specifically to offer high quality sports, focusing on team building and ‘feel good’ fun for all. These children are the next generation, and we think that helping to improve their health and happiness is one of the most important things that we can do.”
The Feel Good Club is funded by the brand new Healthcare Innovation Award from the Boots Charitable Trust, and Boots UK will be running the scheme in collaboration with Nottingham City Care, Nottingham City Council and the University of Nottingham. This new project also plans to open up the high quality facilities in the city to the whole community, creating a space for any child to exercise and enjoy physical activity.
Graham Moran, Chief Executive, Nottingham Forest in the Community comments: “This exciting collaboration with Boots UK will provide local children and their families the opportunity to improve their health and wellbeing by taking part in a wide range of fun based sport and physical activities. The new £1.8 million Forest Sports Zone in the heart of the City will be the hub for a great summer holiday programme. Our intention with Boots UK is to get Nottingham moving more!”
The clubs will be held during the school holidays and will be led by a professionally qualified and experienced team of coaches, aiming to improve levels of physical activity and children’s awareness of nutrition.
Oonagh continues: “Nottingham is the home of Boots UK so we feel incredibly passionate about supporting our local community. We know that parts of its inner-city can be tough places for children to grow up, so the brand new Healthcare Innovation Award and a powerful new partnership with Nottingham Forest in the Community are both exciting steps in providing more opportunities to communities and making physical activity more accessible.”
Lilian Greenwood MP, Nottingham South, comments: “Forest in the Community have a fantastic track record of engaging with young people in our city to get them involved in playing sport and learning new skills. It’s great news that they’ve teamed up with Boots UK to set up the Feel Good Club in Nottingham this summer. This initiative could make a real difference to the health of children and families in our city particularly those from our most-deprived communities. It sounds like great fun and I look forward to going along to see the Club in action.”
Boots UK will be running pilot sessions during May and June, and the Feel Good Clubs will be launched during July. More details about how families can get involved and sign up will be shared closer to the date.
ENDS
Notes to Editors:
- More children in Nottingham City are classed as overweight (38.8%) compared to the national average in England (32.2%)1
- More than 20,000 children in Nottingham are affected by income deprivation, children’s healthcare and social issues are much more prevalent2
- The new Healthcare Innovation Award takes Boots UK back to its roots in Nottingham, where it started as a small herbalist store in 1849, offering herbal solutions to those who couldn’t afford traditional medicines at the time.
- Charities based in Nottinghamshire, which are in need of financial support for a project, can read more about the Boots Charitable Trust and apply for a grant at: www.boots-uk.com/corporate_social_responsibility/community/boots-charitable-trust.aspx.
1 Children aged 10 – 11, 38.8% vs. 33.2% England average - National Child Measurement Programme results 2014/15, Figures taken from HMRC child and working tax credit statistics 2013/14
2 http://www.ncb.org.uk/media/1228318/ncb_poor_beginnings_report_final_for_web.pdf
For more information about the Boots Charitable Trust and its charitable donations, please contact: Bethan Simmons at the Boots UK Press Office on 0115 959 1188, or bethan.simmons@boots.co.uk
About Boots Charitable Trust
Boots Charitable Trust is an independent registered charity in the UK, which is wholly funded by Boots UK.
Established in the early 1970s, to date the Trust has donated over £10 million to fund registered charities and voluntary organisations which benefit people who live in Nottinghamshire.
Boots Charitable Trust also fund smaller voluntary organisations in Nottinghamshire whose income and expenditure is less than £5,000 per year and are therefore not required to register with the Charity Commission.
Boots Charitable Trust is especially interested in projects working in the areas of health, lifelong learning, community development and social care.
About Boots UK
Boots UK (boots.com), the UK’s leading pharmacy-led health and beauty retailer, is part of the Retail Pharmacy International Division of Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (Nasdaq: WBA), the first global pharmacy-led, health and wellbeing enterprise. With 2,510* stores in the UK, Boots UK is committed to providing exceptional customer and patient care, be the first choice for pharmacy and healthcare and offer innovative 'only at Boots' exclusive products such as the UK’s leading skincare brand No7, all delivered with the great value customers love. Created over 165 years ago, the Boots brand is still at the heart of the communities it serves.
*As at 31 August 2015 excluding equity method investments
About Nottingham Forest in the Community
Nottingham Forest Football Club in the Community was launched as a Charity in October 2010. Nottingham Forest’s community outreach programmes have been operating since 1990 delivering football and multi-sport programmes in Nottingham and the County for 25 years. Working in partnership with major professional football bodies, including the Premier League, Football League, the Football League Trust and the Football Association along with key local, regional, and national partners, delivering positive outcomes in health, education, participation in sport and football development.