100 Miles in March for Mind Bloor Homes staff take on mental health challenge
Staff at Bloor Homes’ Exeter region have completed the ‘100 Miles in March’ challenge, organised by national mental health charity Mind, covering a total of 958 miles in 31 days.
The challenge sees those taking part walk, run or cycle 100 miles over the course of the month which not only gets them active whilst fundraising but boosts their mental health too.
Amy Freeman, Natalie Kissane, John Drewett, Will Allan, Andy Eacock, Ellen King, Owen Cresswell, Ryan Joint, Jane Heywood and Laura Martin – all staff from different departments at the new homes developer’s regional Head Office in Exeter, took part, raising a combined total of £500 across the Group for Mind.
Amy Freeman, Office Manager said: Being the newest region in the Bloor Group, the Exeter Team jumped at the chance to take part in their first charity fundraising event, which was organised by the HR Team at Head Office in Measham. We are currently still a small team, so to have 10 people put themselves forward for the challenge was great. We issued weekly total updates to keep us motivated and the competitive banter going between us!
“We are a relatively active team, with a number of runners, cyclists and dog walkers. The weather hasn’t been particularly kind to us this month and we have had some injuries to contend with, but the fact that it was raising money and awareness for such a great charity kept us all going. It is such a fantastic charity giving people instant access to mental health support when they need it.”
In 2022, the 100 Miles in March challenge raised £315,000 across the UK, which equates to 36,000 calls from people needing mental health help. In 2021/2022 the charity:
• responded to over 128,000 queries to its support and information helpline
• enabled 23,500 people to sign up to its Side by Side online peer support community
• provided mental health information which was accessed 21.4 million times
• gave support through Local Minds to 443,000 people
• campaigned to improve services, raise awareness and promote understanding which:
- resulted in almost 2 million people having conversations about mental health as a result of its Time to Talk Day
- was mentioned 14,000 times in the media
- resulted in 6,800 people sharing their lived experiences with the charity to help fight for mental health
- reached over 1.8 million employees through its workplace wellbeing programme