Barclays is once again to be the headline
sponsor of this year’s Pride in London festival
championing the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender (LGBT+) community.
Pride in London is a week-long festival, from
21st to 28th June, celebrating all aspects of
the LGBT community. Last year more than
750,000 people came to Pride in London
and 30,000 people joined the annual
Parade, which is one of the city’s biggest
one-day events, second only to the London
Marathon, and one of the world’s biggest
LGBT+ celebrations. This year’s Parade
takes place on Saturday 27th June, alongside
the festival in Trafalgar Square and activities
in Soho.
The theme of this year’s event is ‘Heroes’,
celebrating individuals who have
contributed to LGBT+ rights over the years.
Participants are being asked to nominate
their own heroes, from the famous to the
unsung, and to share their suggestions via
the Twitter hashtag #PrideHeroes. ‘Heroes’
follows the success of last year’s award
winning #FreedomTo campaign which ran
across social, digital, OOH and PR channels,
driving record-breaking attendance to
the event and helping to change attitudes
towards LGBT+ people.
Barclays has been a close partner of Pride
in London since its inception two years
ago and was headline sponsor for the first
time in 2014. During the festival it will be
offering participants the opportunity to ‘Ping
for Pride’ – using its Pingit payment app
which allows anyone with a bank account to
donate to Pride in London from their phone
or to donate via Twitter.
Event-goers will also be able to use Pingit to
pay for items such as drinks and food more
easily, safely, simply and quickly than with
cash. They will not need to be Barclays
customers to use the Pingit app.
Val Soranno Keating, Barclays’ Global
LGBT+ lead and CEO of Barclaycard, said:
“Pride in London is a highlight of the
LGBT+ calendar in the UK and a key
element in our own programme of activities
in support of diversity and inclusion in
the workplace, and we are delighted to
be supporting as headline sponsor for the
second year running.
“Our on-going relationship with Pride, both
in London and across the UK, is just one of
the ways in which we show our commitment
to the LGBT+ community. At Barclays we
want our colleagues, customers and clients
to feel free to express who they are at all
times. We’ve made great strides internally in
creating an inclusive global workplace, but
we want to go further. By supporting Pride
in London, we’re saying “this is who we are”
and we want to encourage everyone else to
be able to say who they are, without fear.”
Michael Salter, Chair for Pride in London,
commented:
“Pride in London has become one of the
city’s largest annual events, and last year’s
festivities were enjoyed by more people than
ever before – so it’s fantastic that Barclays
are again supporting the event as our
headline sponsor.
“With our new #PrideHeroes campaign
we’re encouraging people to celebrate
and acknowledge the personal and
historic heroes within our community,
whether friends and family, factual or
fictional, historic or living, political or
celebrity. People will be able to publically
acknowledge their heroes and celebrate the
positive impact they have had on their lives
and the broader LGBT+ community.”
For companies, brands or organisations
wanting to be involved in the festival, Pride
in London has varying levels of sponsorship
on offer, with strictly limited numbers
of packages available, plus some one-off,
bespoke opportunities.
Find out more about Pride in London-
prideinlondon.org
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Barclays returns for headline
sponsorship of Pride in London
SUMMER 2015
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