21/03/2025
By Tara Fisher FIEP, Chief Operating Officer at Marmalade Trust
Marmalade Trust has joined the IEP as a Corporate Affiliate Partner to strengthen our commitment to raising awareness of loneliness and supporting individuals experiencing loneliness and social isolation. We are excited to work with the amazing professionals within the employability sector to recognise, understand, respond and support people experiencing loneliness. We know that:
- Being unemployed/economically inactive is a socially isolating experience
- 70% of people experiencing unemployment report feeling lonely
- People feeling lonely are more likely to be further from the labour market
- People in work who are experiencing loneliness are much less likely to remain in employment
- Loneliness costs employers £2.5 billion per year, and costs the economy £32 billion per year
This partnership enables us to connect with a network of industry professionals and enhance the impact of our aims by fostering collaboration and professional development opportunities within the sector. We can’t wait to get started!
Marmalade Trust is an award-winning loneliness charity for all ages, dedicated to raising awareness of loneliness and supporting people to find new social connections. Our mission is simple: to create a society where we recognise that loneliness exists and support each other to make new connections.
Marmalade Trust was started in 2013 by healthcare professional Amy Perrin OBE. Through the nature of her work, Amy was always aware of loneliness and she wanted to do something to reduce the stigma around it and help to build a more connected society.
Through volunteering, Amy met three older people spending Christmas Day alone. Seeing the shortage of Christmas events in Bristol, she took them out herself. Amy was approached by GPs and even a local bank clerk asking if she could include more people, and soon three became eighteen! After Christmas, with a doormat piled high with thank you cards, Amy realised the importance of what had been achieved and Marmalade Trust was born.
Since the beginning, Marmalade Trust has had a unique way of talking about loneliness. We recognise that loneliness is a natural human emotion that we will all experience at some time in our lives, and it is nothing to be ashamed of. Since we launched we have directly helped thousands of people and have reached millions more with these messages. We support people experiencing loneliness in three ways:
- By hosting training webinars for businesses, community groups, charities, and education settings and sharing practical guides to help people of all ages deepen their understanding of loneliness.
- Through our global annual campaign, Loneliness Awareness Week, which engages people to open conversations around loneliness and establish new connections
- Through our cornerstone projects — Christmas Cheer, which brings joy and companionship to those on their own on Christmas Day, and Marmalade Connections, a highly personalised phone service based on a social prescribing model that supports people experiencing loneliness to social connection
As recognised experts in our field, we are passionate about sharing our knowledge to help others. Through our webinar programme, which launched in May 2022, we have supported over 600 attendees across well-known organisations. With the shared session recordings, we have reached upwards of 44,520 employees. Continuing to build relationships within the corporate sector is a key part of our aim to reduce feelings of loneliness in the workplace and beyond.
