Be Active Be Healthy – the new Playdale staff mantra!

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Earlier on this year, in conjunction with Clare Tonkin, Fitness Coordinator at North Country Leisure’s Ulverston Leisure Centre, we launched our very first ‘Be Active, Be Healthy’ campaign. The idea behind it was to motivate and encourage the workforce to be healthy and active. With a healthier staff, there’s no doubt that any business can be more productive and successful as a team.

The nine week campaign involved free body composition analysis and advice on healthy eating and becoming more active. There was also a series of free activities on offer for all staff including gym passes, exercise classes and various sports. To ensure that activities would be arranged that staff would be interested in taking part in, a survey was circulated and the activities planned were based on the results received. Ulverston Leisure Centre revisited our three sites midway through, and at the end of the nine weeks to monitor progress, offer ongoing support and advice then collate the final results!

To make it more of a team challenge, and to add an incentive for everyone, Playdale agreed to donate £1 for every kilogram of weight lost to the fantastic fundraising efforts of our CNC and CGL Assemblies Team Leader Matt McGinley who ran this year’s London Marathon on behalf of the charity Fields in Trust which we closely work with and support. There was also an individual incentive of a sports shop gift voucher for the ‘biggest loser’. The campaign began…

Within no time at all there was a real sense of determination, encouragement and desire within the offices and factories to ‘Be Active and Be Healthy’. Staff motivated each other to take part in the activities on offer, drink more water, cut down on treats and think about improving their lifestyles in general. The activities and opportunities available included; seven day Ulverston Leisure Centre gym passes, free exercise classes at Ulverston Leisure Centre, weekly Playdale lunchtime fitness walks, a Playdale lunchtime Pilates class and a Playdale Cyclone spinning class.

You can see from the photo gallery how much fun everyone had taking part in the many varied activities. As well as the obvious health benefits, they were also a great opportunity for team building too!

The mid-way monitoring and advice appointments were invaluable as they kept staff on track and spurred them on to keep pushing and keep going. The nine weeks were soon over and the results were in. Sixty-seven people took part altogether and between them, lost a grand total of 71.8kg. The equivalent of a whole person! 78.1kg of fat lost was a fantastic amount and the muscle gained was an impressive total of 19.5kg.

Our ‘biggest loser’ was Corne Els who lost an amazing 13lbs, closely followed by Frazer Stewart who lost 12.5lbs.

At the end of the campaign Clare Tonkin told us, “It’s been a real pleasure to see people’s numbers changing for the better, especially those who have lost visceral fat, and those who have switched ‘category’ from obese to overweight and from overweight to healthy. It’s also great to hear how much more active everyone has tried to be. I hope we can continue to work together to make Playdale a healthy, active workforce!”

Thank you Clare, we couldn’t have done it without you!

Our Be Active, Be Healthy campaign has been a fantastic start to the year for the Playdale team. We now need to make sure we maintain our healthy new lifestyles!

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