The Entertainer, the fastest-growing, family owned high street toy retailer in the UK, has announced the launch of The Big Book Rehoming in partnership with The Salvation Army to aid the 1 in 11A* children from disadvantaged homes who don’t own a book of their own.
The campaign will run across all of The Entertainer’s 172 stores from Thursday 5 March, aligning with World Book Day, the annual event which sees children across the world wearing fancy dress to celebrate their favourite storybook characters.
The Entertainer is calling on families to donate their unwanted children’s books, so they can be rehomed with underprivileged families. The National Literacy Trust found children from underprivileged homes who don’t own a book are six times less likely to read at their expected level.
The Big Book Rehoming aims to encourage all families to read more, after researchB* commissioned by The Entertainer of 807 families across Britain found that, 1 in 5 (20%) families spend less than an hour a week reading with their children and 1 in 12 (8%) spent less than half an hour reading with their children.
In contrast, a third of families (30%), spend over 2 hours a week watching YouTube videos together with 1 in 7 households quizzed spending more than four hours watching YouTube together each week.
When asked to rank the importance of doing activities together as a family, making social media content together such as creating social posts, Tik Tok and YouTube videos also ranked higher than reading. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the most, 14% of families said making YouTube content was the most important thing to do together and 8% of families said reading was the least important.
When it came to getting out and about as a family, out of school clubs and trips to the cinema were regular activities on the family calendar with nearly a third of families going to the cinema every month and out of school classes being visited every 2-3 days for a quarter of families. In contrast, a quarter of families (22%) never visited a library.
Gary Grant, Founder and Executive Chairman of The Entertainer says, “We are extremely pleased to launch The Big Book Rehoming in partnership with The Salvation Army. Reading is such an important part of childhood learning and development. Knowledge and education are fundamental building blocks for life and missing out on having books to read can take away the freedom and imagination reading can inspire. We’re proud to be helping to rehome books with children who need them whilst continuing to support the work of The Salvation Army.”
Kirk Bradley, Head of Corporate Partnerships of The Salvation Army Trading Company says, “After the success of The Big Toy Rehoming campaign we are delighted to partner with The Entertainer for The Big Book Rehoming. Donations from members of the public help The Salvation Army in continuing to provide practical and emotional support to vulnerable people in the UK. This is another vital campaign which benefits those who need it most and we are overjoyed to be taking part.”
The donated books will help to support The Salvation Army and its services, providing assistance to vulnerable people which can include their parent and toddler groups and disadvantaged families.
The Big Book Rehoming will run from March 5 to March 14 in all 172 of The Entertainer’s stores nationwide.
For more information about The Entertainer, please visit: www.thetoyshop.com.
A* Data source the National Literacy Trust Annual Literacy Survey 2019
B* Research commissioned by The Entertainer of 807 families across Britain, completed on 15 February 2020
