Investing in healthy futures

The DfE's recent State of the nation 2022: children and young people’s wellbeing report highlighted the scale of the public health challenge facing primary age children, with 23% of those in Year 6 now considered obese.

Brands have an important role helping reimagine children's healthy lives.

In recent years, this health challenge has been exacerbated by the pandemic - lockdowns led to more sedentary lifestyles and less exercising for most of us. But now the biggest barrier to healthier lifestyles is the cost-of-living crisis.

The unaffordability of activity clubs, rising supermarket prices, and lack of availability of good, fresh produce are making the problem worse - and will make it harder for struggling families to adopt healthy habits.

Combine this with funding pressures facing schools, who are often having to cut breakfast clubs and extra-curricular provision, and it paints a bleak picture. Across the country, it’s the poorest families who most depend on the opportunities provided at school – and who will be most impacted by these cuts.

This matters, because we know that the habits formed early in childhood are likely to continue through teenage and adult life.

Get this right, and it creates a relationship that lasts a lifetime.

Amongst the financial pressures facing society, it would be easy to neglect the importance of supporting healthy lifestyles for children – but there's plenty of evidence that right now, it’s one of the best investments we can make.

“Made by Sports found children… participating in school sports are 5.6 more likely to report high resilience, and 20% less likely to suffer from a mental health disorder” (CSJ report).

The evidence is overwhelming: exercise matters.

Off the back of DfE's State of the nation, where rising levels of anxiety was one of the biggest stories, we can’t afford to see getting kids active as an optional extra. Add in the cost of living crisis, and healthy lifestyles are simply out of reach for many parents.

This is a social justice issue – and it will affect those from disadvantaged backgrounds the most. Children living in deprived areas are the most likely to be obese: 31% in the most deprived postcodes are obese, compared with 13.5% in the least deprived (NHS).

And brands have a part to play in inspiring children to form healthy habits.

Now is the time to reimagine how we support children to live healthy lives.

With the evidence showing how important the primary years are in forming habits, taking innovative action with younger children is a great opportunity for brands to have meaningful impact - and earn public goodwill.

We know the public strongly supports government action on this issue – brands can get ahead of policy by demonstrating their commitment to supporting children and families to lead healthy lives.

Those that lead the way will set themselves up for a long-term relationship with Generation Alpha.

How brands can become champions of change:

• 1. Brands and schools are well placed to form long-term partnerships

  Schools have sustained contact with children – making them one of the key channels to help create meaningful behaviour change which catalyses change in their communities.

• 2. Empower children to transform their relationship with healthy habits

  ‘Feeling in control’ is a key factor in pupils’ enjoyment of exercise. We help brands create engaging activities that children enjoy – and want to keep coming back to.

• 3. Identify the unique assets you can bring to the table

  Different brands will have different unique products or channels they can repurpose to support families. We can help you identify those opportunities.

We have a track record of creating change in this space...

At Hopscotch, we know how to drive purpose through the power of education. We create work that transforms lives - getting to the heart of the issues that matter to young people, families, and communities. And we know what makes them tick.

We've already kickstarted this mission in secondary schools. We knew girls disconnected from sport and exercise as they hit their teens and wanted to change that. Working in partnership with Sport England, we took the celebrated This Girl Can campaign in a new direction to build positive PE experiences with Studio You.

Whatever it is, we can help you to use insight and creativity to deliver on your business objectives and drive your social impact work. Let’s chat.