How a wet Thursday in Greenwich turned into a year of running.

An entertainer working harder than the rest of us put together. And somewhere in the middle of it, me, soaked through but having a far better morning than the weather deserved.

That was 11 June.

And it’s the reason Ginkgo is now a charity partner of MumsAid.

Why were we all walking?

Our friends at More2 Nurseries had asked if we’d come and help. They’re long time supporters of MumsAid, and every child was walking 1,001 metres to raise money for it. (The number isn’t random. MumsAid supports mums from pregnancy through the first couple of years of a baby’s life, and each metre stands for a day of that.)

A handful of the Ginkgo team turned up across the two routes to guide small children along a riverside path in the rain. That was the full extent of our ambition that morning. We were there to hold hands and count heads.

What does MumsAid do?

Somewhere between Olympian Way and the Old Royal Naval College I found myself walking alongside Eleanor Glogowska from MumsAid, and asked her more about what the charity actually does.

Mums get free, specialist mental health support at exactly the point in life when they’re least likely to ask for it and most likely to be told they’re fine. No referral needed, no diagnosis needed. There’s a creche, so that having a baby with you isn’t a reason to miss a session. Sessions run in community venues, because for some women a clinic is the very thing that stops them coming through the door.

I was interested. So I told her a bit about us, and waited for the moment where a financial advice firm and a mental health charity politely run out of things to say to each other…

It never came.

What do a charity and a financial adviser have in common?

We’re firm believers at Ginkgo that wellbeing has three parts: physical, mental and financial. That third part often gets put in a box, away from the other two. But money worry keeps people awake, and being awake at 3am makes every decision the next day harder. Any financial adviser who has sat across a table from someone in a bad year knows the advice is only half the job. The other half is taking enough weight off them that they can think straight again.

That is what MumsAid does, for different people at a different moment.

Where do grandparents fit in?

There were a lot of grandparents on that walk, pushing buggies and carrying spare socks and taking a whole morning off to be there. They do the nursery run, give up a day a week so their daughters (and sometimes sons) can go back to work, and take on a share of the strain that never appears in anybody’s budget.

It dawned on me then that grandparents are the link between MumsAid and us at Ginkgo. More and more of you come to us now as grandparents rather than as retirees. Can we help our children out with a deposit? Should we cover the nursery fees? What does it do to our own plans if we do? They’re conversations we have often. The same family, seen from both ends.

Had we met before?

ater on, comparing notes about our daughters, Ellie and I realised that they go to the same dance school. I’d simply never recognised her without a Spotlight bag in her hand!
That’s South East London for you. You’re rarely more than one connection away from somebody.

So what happens next?

We’ve sponsored MumsAid’s running vests, so you’ll see our name on the backs of supporter who’ll be taking on some iconic running challenges in the coming year: starting with the Hampton Court Half in October and the Amsterdam Marathon the weekend after. We’ll also be looking at other ways to help, and other things we can do together.

Some of us will be running, too, and I’ll let my colleagues tell you about that in their own time and at their own pace. Watch this space!

I also want to use the year to say why this one matters. There are a lot of mums on the Ginkgo team, and every one of us has or had a mother, so motherhood is about as universal as experience gets. I have my own reason for wanting to support MumsAid, and I’ll write about it another time. I know I’m not the only one here, and I hope my colleagues will tell you their reasons in their own words.

Why does a walk in the rain matter?

None of this came out of a strategy meeting. It came out of saying yes to a wet Thursday with 120 small children and a bag of bubbles.

Connection is what carries people through a hard stretch. A neighbour. A nursery. A grandparent. A charity. A firm that’s been in the same corner of Blackheath for fourteen years. You can’t plan for it. You can only be out there where it happens.

If you’ve got ten minutes, do have a look at what MumsAid does. And look out for running news soon!

Debra Blundell, Co-founder and Head of Marketing