Berghaus is providing leading educational charity, The Outward Bound Trust (The Trust), with new rucksacks to help its instructors as they introduce young people to outdoor activities. The brand has been a long-time partner of the trust and every year provides vital financial support and discounted kit to the organisation. This year, in addition to regular donations, Berghaus has sent 40 extra Trailhead packs for instructors at Outward Bound’s Eskdale centre.
Berghaus and The Trust have been working together since 2006. As well as providing kit to its staff in centres around the UK, Berghaus has donated over £80,000 to the organisation over the years and has supported a range of other initiatives. In addition, Berghaus chairman Sir Chris Bonington is deputy patron of The Trust, and sponsored athlete Leo Houlding is a trustee.
The Trust was founded in 1941 and has since helped over 1.2m young people to experience learning and adventure in the wild. Berghaus has been Outward Bound’s official kit provider since 2006, as part of the company’s ongoing strategy to promote the positive effects that outdoor activities have on people’s mental and physical health and wellbeing. Berghaus supplies instructors with high performance outdoor gear and has also actively involved them in its new product development with many of them testing new clothing, rucksacks and footwear designs before they are signed off for production.
Kev McFadyen, Brand Director at Berghaus, said, “Our partnership with The Outward Bound Trust is one that we value very highly. The Trust does an amazing job of introducing generation after generation of young people to the outdoors. Many of them develop a lifelong love of adventure and some of them go on to forge their own careers in our industry, including with Berghaus. We’re proud to be official kit provider for The Trust and play our role in the fantastic work that their instructors do every year.”
Graeme Shilland, Operations Manager at Outward Bound Eskdale, added, “As a charity we are reliant on the generous support of companies like Berghaus. We are so grateful for their recent donation of rucksacks. These will be incredibly well loved as our instructors use them whilst leading young people on their adventures in the great outdoors”.
The Trust’s new strategy ‘The Mountains Are Calling’ will now guide its work in the coming years through clearly living up to its purpose, mission and values. It identifies three areas of priority and three areas of experimentation.
PRIORITIES
Becoming Bigger – the acquisition and bringing on stream of an additional 120 beds; raising the capital and bursary funds to maintain this expansion; a clearer and louder voice to the outside world to support this.
Becoming Better – by improving course quality, upgrading facilities, improving systems, good financial stewardship, realising the value on recent investments.
Becoming Stronger – being able to cope with more and developing a motivated and skilled workforce.
The three areas of ‘experimentation’ come under an overall heading of ‘Becoming Bolder’.
- Doing more to align evaluation and practice.
- Looking more carefully at who The Trust works with so as to better target those suffering from a poverty of opportunity.
- Taking the first steps toward creating a more diverse workforce.
Traynor On The Trail 