Small Pennies make a Big Difference!

Last week, I was proud to be part of a passionate set of individuals, businesses and like-minded northern folk who 'launched' the superb concept of Pennies - a fintech charity with a BIG mission to lead the micro-donation movement - into Manchester, in the beautiful setting of the recently refurbished Manchester Stock Exchange hotel.

If you don’t yet know Pennies, they have actually been pioneering micro-donations (little donations to charity when making a purchase by card, such as when paying the bill in a restaurant?) for almost 10 years through their ‘digital charity box’. And yes, despite this impressive record - I am sure their inspiring CEO, Alison Hutchinson, wouldn’t mind me saying this – they are still the industry’s best kept secret!

I was invited to the charity’s annual event in London last year and I was blown away by the simplicity of the concept and how much it could raise for charities the nation over. But I quickly realised that a lot of their 65+ live partners (in retail, hospitality and leisure sectors) were southern-based. And I thought: “I’m not ‘avin this! We’re far more giving and lovely up North (??) and I spoke with Alison and agreed I’d help get them a much-needed foothold in the North (cos obviously I’ve nothing else to do with my time!)

For context, we know it’s a tough time (and getting tougher!) for retail and research from the Charities Aid Foundation shows that giving to charity has also dropped - falling by 4% points between 2016 and 2018.

Part of the reason for the latter is that – as potential donors – we don’t have as much change in our pockets and purses as we used to. In the North West, Pennies found last year that almost half of us, 44%, leave the house frequently to every day without any cash on us. We also find that many of us carry a palpable feeling that we can’t make a difference alone as our contribution could never be enough to make a difference.

But there is a strong proven concept in Pennies, and a specific opportunity in the North West to be embraced!

I’ve talked before about why we should celebrate all the little acts of human kindness we experience in our everyday lives. Well Pennies gives us all a chance to do this.

And the strength of the North West region in business, leisure and retail terms lends a huge opportunity to support regional charities through micro-donations; charities which play such a crucial role supporting those who need it in our culturally diverse, innovative and pioneering communities.

Our opportunity in the North West

The good news is a few businesses operating in the North West are already using Pennies. A number of national chains already offer Pennies – including The Entertainer toy shop, Topps Tiles, Zizzi and Ask, not to mention hundreds of independent roadside retailers.

At our event, Alison told us that, last year alone, in excess of ￡400,000 was raised by Pennies partners’ in the North West. What a fantastic achievement, by just a small number of digital pennies at a time!

We also heard that, if every card holder in North West donated just 35p per week (the average price of a Freddo chocolate bar), we could raise around an extra ￡100m a year for our charities.

Let’s use this simple opportunity to raise even more money for our own charities and the communities they support, during a tough old time – I'm sure you'll agree, it’s NEVER been more important.

(Massive thanks again to The Stock Exchange Hotel/Bull & Bear for the hire of the room, to our key note speakers, Ryan Giggs and Sally Hopson from Sofology (and her team), to William Lees Jones, CEO of JW Lees for providing the all important alcoholic refreshments and to Sue Benson from The Behaviours Agency for helping with the event management.)

To find out more about Pennies, and how to get involved in a national effort that has already raised ￡22m for UK charities and given people the choice to click ‘yes’ when prompted to give by card over 90m times – look them up www.pennies.org.uk. Or leave me a message under this post and I will be very proud to introduce you.