THINK PINK

It’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month – which means a chance to support our life-changing, boob-checking Tickled Pink campaign. Asda charity lead Jo Warner has the feels...

INTERVIEW RACHAEL STILES PHOTOGRAPHS JO DENISON

What is Tickled Pink all about? It is a partnership between Asda and two breast cancer charities, CoppaFeel! and Breast Cancer Now. It was created in 1996, when a colleague lobbied the business to get behind supporting breast cancer as an issue. Back then, around 37,000 women a year were diagnosed with breast cancer. That has risen to 55,000 a year in 2022. We all need to be talking about it.

What does Tickled Pink actually do? Through the generosity of our customers and colleagues we have raised £77m to date, and we want to raise £100m by 2026. We focus on awareness-raising, not just on breast cancer, but how everyone should get to know their boobs and pecs. If they notice something that’s unusual for them, they should see a GP as soon as possible. Our research has found that 30% of our customers have never checked themselves. But 40% do it regularly, so that’s positive. We have millions of customers shopping with us each week, so we use our stores and our products for visibility and messaging – on our changing room mirrors, lingerie labels, period products, pharmacy bags and receipts. You may have seen Asda home delivery vans with ‘breast check’ messages. They’re disruptive and very pink. Watch out for our brand-new awareness campaign, The Real Self Checkout, in store during October.

Why is this so close to your heart? I lead all of Asda’s charity partnerships – it’s the best job! But I also have had my own experience of breast cancer. My two sisters have had it too. We were all in our twenties – there’s a strong family history – so it is very important to me and I’ve seen first-hand the benefit of an early diagnosis. I get to work with an amazing team to come up with engaging, disruptive campaigns, so that more people know checking is something that should be part of their routine, and could save their life.

Meet Jo!

She’s our Senior Director of Corporate Responsibility & ESG

We have funded over 500,000

hours of research, leading to 400 world-class scientific discoveries for treatments.

Creating our T-shirt slogans

For this year’s Tickled Pink T-shirts, a panel of inspiring women living with breast cancer shared the meaningful, positive or empowering slogans that personally helped them through their breast cancer journey. One of them is Mikki, 30, who lives with incurable, secondary breast cancer. Her slogan ‘Grow through what you go through’ is shown on the previous page. Mikki says: “Despite the issues, I am very positive and hopeful and just try to make the most of life. With my health, travelling can be difficult, so I’m trying to stay in as many counties in the UK as possible, in as many types of accommodation (a converted bus is next on my list!) and have as many animal encounters as possible. What’s important to me is making memories and having fun with the people I love.”

How can people get involved? By getting to know the signs and symptoms of breast cancer, checking your chest regularly and encouraging friends and family to do the same. There are lots of resources online, such as on Breast Cancer Now and CoppaFeel!’s websites where you can find information. The other way to help is to donate (either online, or in store during October) or by buying one of our pink products or a Tickled Pink T-shirt. You can even volunteer at our national bucket collection which is taking place on Saturday 15 and Sunday 16 October. You can sign up to your local store here: breastcancernow.org/asda-bucket-collection

What makes the T-shirts special this year? George always does such a great job of finding a product that will raise lots of money. This year, the T-shirts have inspirational quotes, and the colours are lovely. We want them to be wearable and not date, so they’re something to keep for years.

How else can people support Tickled Pink? During Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October, you’ll see a lot of Tickled Pink messaging around our stores, websites and social media. We want to be very visible. During October, we, along with our supportive suppliers, turn the receipts pink and we have all sorts of products that we’ve turned pink, from chocolate to toiletries, always with a donation to our charity partners. We also have a bouquet that is available year round. So, when you do your next shop, please opt for the pink version!

Everyone affected by breast cancer can turn to Breast Cancer Now for support. To find a free support service near you visit breastcancernow.org/services or call our Helpline on 0808 800 6000.

CoppaFeel!

We meet Natalie Haskell, CEO of the breast cancer awareness charity

At CoppaFeel!, we want to make everyone breast-aware at a younger age, so they are in a better place to get to know their boobs and pecs. We do this by encouraging young people to have a look and feel of their body to build up that familiarity. We educate them on the signs and symptoms of breast cancer, and empower them to speak to their GP if they notice anything new or unusual. With funding from Asda Tickled Pink, we have been able to reach over four million young people with our ‘Know Yourself’ campaign, and have seen an extra 200,000 young people checking their chests regularly.

To become a checking champion yourself, you can use the CoppaFeel! selfcheckout app (see self-

checkout.coppafeel.

org) and text ASDA to 82228 to get a free monthly reminder to check your boobs, pecs or chest regularly.

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