Kiddimoto charity partnership of the year, meet Above and Beyond.

We have teamed up with local hospital charity Above & Beyond to support the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children and raise awareness about the importance of wearing helmets.

On Tuesday 8 August, the Kiddimoto team visited the children’s hospital to host a play day, donate some of their award-winning balance bikes, scooters, ride-ons and helmets to the Play Centre and to launch a ‘Design Your Own Helmet’ competition.

Children aged 5 to 15 are invited to design a brand new helmet which will be brought to life by the Kiddimoto design team and go into production in time for Christmas. For every one of these specially designed helmets sold worldwide, £5 will be donated to Above & Beyond.

As well as our fantastic competition, we are also donating £1 from every helmet sold from Kiddimoto.co.uk to Above & Beyond. This will help the charity to invest in projects that make a real difference to families from Bristol and across the South West. Funds generated from helmet sales will help support the 88,000 young patients treated at the children’s hospital each year.

Michael Carter, Consultant Paediatric Neurosurgeon at the children’s hospital, said: “Riding bikes and playing on scooters is a very common childhood activity but, of course, it puts a small child at risk of injury because they’re travelling quite fast and often in the vicinity of fairly hard things like the ground, walls, gates and so on. It doesn’t take a great leap of imagination to see how an impact between a fast moving small child and a hard object could do a great deal of damage. An ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure I think, in most circumstances, and never more so than when you’re dealing with head injuries in children. I would definitely advise that people wear helmets when riding, not just children but adults as well.”

Of the partnership with Above & Beyond, Simon Booth, founder of Kiddimoto, said: “We are so pleased to be working with Above & Beyond as they do some incredible work in the hospitals in Bristol. This partnership gives us an opportunity to give something back to the community and also make a real difference by highlighting the importance of bike safety. We’re really looking forward to seeing the helmet designs that the kids come up with and to supporting the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children via Above & Beyond.”

Catherine Harris, Corporate Partnerships Fundraising Officer at Above & Beyond, added: “We’re so excited to be working in partnership with Simon and the team at Kiddimoto as their chosen charity. It’s thanks to the wonderful support of local businesses such as Kiddimoto that we’re able to fund projects within Bristol children’s hospital above and beyond what the NHS can afford so thank you. We’re all looking forward to an exciting year of events and activities.”

The ‘Design Your Own Helmet’ competition deadline is Thursday 31 August. Entries are open to all children aged 5 to 15 and can be submitted to a collection box at the reception of Bristol children’s hospital, by post to Kiddimoto HQ or scanned and emailed to info@kiddimoto.co.uk.

For more information and to download an application form, visit www.aboveandbeyond.org.uk.

For further press information please contact Lisa Brennan via lisa.brennan@aboveandbeyond.org.uk or call 0117 3700 844

Above & Beyond (www.aboveandbeyond.org.uk)

• Above & Beyond is the local hospitals’ charity raising funds for all nine of Bristol city centre hospital sites.
• The charity fundraises to create welcoming hospital environments, fund innovative research and provide world-class facilities, support staff training and development and purchase state-of-the-art equipment.
• Each year, they raise £3 million in projects that make a real difference to patient care and hospital experience.
• Working with inspirational local people, Above & Beyond aims to make a difference to every patient and every condition.  When patients, their families and friends want to say thank you for the care they’ve received at the hospitals, they come to Above & Beyond.
• Twitter aboveandbeyond1 Facebook: Above & Beyond Charity You Tube Above & Beyond
• Registered Charity No. 229945