News
10 Jun 2010: KICK4CHANGE TO SCORE FOR THE KIDS IN SOUTH AFRICA
As the World Cup kicks off in South Africa, two social entrepreneurs are looking to bring some football magic into the lives of thousands of kids blighted by poverty in the nation’s townships.
While the highest paid stars will be competing for the game’s ultimate trophy, away from the glitz and glamour of the tournament around 80 per cent of South African kids will be kicking a plastic bottle around in bare feet – perhaps hoping one day to follow in the footsteps of their multi-millionaire heroes.
Life is often bleak in the South African townships but two fledgling businessmen have joined forces with South African charities to get local kids kitted out with new 4sport football boots, and are now looking to transfer all of their manufacturing to the land-locked kingdom of Lesotho, Africa.
Simon Brown and Jamie Tosh are the founders of ethical football boot manufacturer and community interest company, Kick4Change.
The pair have partnered with two charities, Kick4Life and The Sports Trust in a move to hand out hundreds of pairs of boots to some of the poorest kids on the planet.
Kick4Life is a Lesotho-based charity which uses the power of football to teach young people about HIV prevention and healthy living – 23 per cent of the Lesotho population have HIV. Among 30 to 40 year olds it is 40 per cent and more than 100,000 children in Lesotho have been orphaned by AIDS.
The Sports Trust is based in Johannesburg and offers sporting experiences to children. On a recent visit Jamie and Simon joined both charities on trips to the townships to distribute 400 pairs of football boots.
They have also begun to source a Lesotho footwear manufacture to transfer production of their boots from China to the impoverished African nation.
Simon says: “To experience first-hand the often squalid conditions many kids have to live in has made us even more determined to manufacturer all of our boots in Lesotho. We received such a warm welcome and it was the best feeling in the world to see the smiles on the kids' faces when they got the boots.
“We are determined to create Kick4Change into the world’s leading producer of ethical football boots while retaining our social enterprise business model. Our ultimate goal is that for every pair of boots sold, we can donate another pair to an African charity.
The Kick4Change concept began in 2008 when Jamie, who coaches his son’s under-8’s football team, decided to turn his love of football into a community-focused company to make sport accessible to all.
To help kick start the venture, Simon and Jamie secured around £65,000 of investment from the Key Fund Yorkshire which provides grants, loans and equity investment to social enterprises.
Simon says it was essential that they secured finance from a social enterprise funder, and without investment from the Key Fund it would have extremely difficult to get the venture of the ground.
The pair, who quit their jobs in the middle of the recession, spent around 18 months designing and developing the boots, which Simon says ‘are of the highest quality material and design to rival anything on the market’.
However, unlike rival products, they are available from size 8 – most branded boots start at 10 - up to size 3. The boots retail at £14.99 – which Simon says is around half the price or similar quality branded boots.
The Kick4Change website went live in last December and for every pair of boots sold in the UK, 100 per cent of the profits go to schools, clubs and other good causes.
Fifty per cent is paid directly back to schools and grass roots sports clubs whose parents purchase the products. The remaining 50 per cent goes into the asset lock, to be further used for investing in grass roots sports.
Jamie added: “We recognise that sport can shape, develop and improve young lives. We are committed to making sport accessible for as many young people as possible, allowing them to benefit from the life skills and experiences that only sport can provide.
“That is why we have initially designed and developed football boots that are accessible to everyone. Irrespective of ability, race, colour or creed, sport should be played and enjoyed by all.”
The pair have big ambitious plans for Kick4change which has won a number of business awards. They are in negotiations with some of the UK’s biggest retailers to stock their boots. They have also recently sold 1,300 pairs of boots to corporate giant Investec which plans to use their as part of their own corporate social responsibility – an area where Simon and Jamie want to develop further.
For more information please go to the kick4change website.
