We – you, me, every leader in British retail – have been handed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to prevent a potentially life- and sector-changing incoming mental health storm.
Retail Trust believes the health of all our colleagues is the foundation of the ongoing success of British retail. We believe in a world where everyone involved in retail has access to help and support to manage their wellbeing whenever they need it.
To succeed, we must protect the health and happiness of millions of retail workers, which is being hit hard in these unprecedented times, and we must work together and act now.
While one in four adults will experience a mental health problem at some point in their life, the Trust believes we should be there for the four in four colleagues – in other words, everyone – who will experience a setback or life event of some sort. Access to our pioneering approach to emotional, physical, vocational and financial services can make a huge difference to how they deal with those challenges.
“Applications to Retail Trust from people seeking health support, the vast majority of which related to mental health issues, rose 164% year on year in June and July”
Now is an incredibly difficult time for those working in retail: the impact of the pandemic has hit them hard, financially, emotionally and physically.
Between March and July this year, Retail Trust received a 50% increase in applications for financial aid and observed a 404% year-on-year uplift in the number of visitors to our website looking for online support.
Applications from people seeking health support, the vast majority of which related to mental health issues, rose 164% year on year in June and July.
Between January and August, we provided 3,400 counselling sessions to help colleagues struggling with difficult emotions and situations, and we have gifted £381,090 worth of non-repayable grants to keep some of our most vulnerable colleagues from becoming homeless, unable to feed their families or make essential hospital visits.
On the eve of World Mental Health Day and ahead of National Work Life Week (October 12-16), we are launching our 2020 Health of Retail report, authored by the trust’s chief medical adviser Dr Adrian Massey.
This report, which can be downloaded from retailtrust.org.uk, identifies a triumvirate of pandemic-induced stress and anxiousness facing UK retail workers:
- Financial instability because of store closures, financial performance, job losses, the end of furlough payments and uncertainty around the incoming Job Support Scheme;
- Uncertainty and the fear of the unknown, caused by the threat of redundancy and the overwhelming nature of negative mainstream reporting about the future of our industry;
- Social disconnect, at home and at work, as a result of lockdown restrictions, which have also led to an increase in physical, verbal and racial assaults from customers and a ‘hero to zero’ change in public opinion about store workers.
So, today, we’re calling on you to join us and be there #forthefour.
We all have a responsibility to look after the people that contribute to retail’s financial success and to build a healthy, happy, diverse and inclusive workforce that reflects retail’s position as the premier industry in the UK economy.
The trust is holding an online event, Championing the Health of Retail, between October 19 and 21. Presenters include Boots chief operating officer Tracey Clements, Dixons Carphone chief people Officer Paula Coughlan, former Asda chief executive Andy Clarke and Asos non-executive director Rita Clifton.
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