If you can't donate milk, but want to support milk banking...

[organiccarrotcake]

What would you be prepared to do?

Or if you are the parents of a pre-term baby that you'd want to benefit from donor milk (or has) would you be prepared to do anything to support milk banking generally (in which case, what?)

I'm not asking for anyone to commit to anything - it's all hypothetical!! Just doing research.

You guys are fab!

threefeet I did some work on BFAW to promote milk banking (and the NCT as a separate thing actually) but will be planning bigger events next year. But it's not really well known outside of "BFing circles", ironically.

Thank you so much for the offer! I will PM you to discuss further.

WRT jumping out of planes... that was on my list - anyone know of somewhere that's set up to do this for charities?

So are you all UKAMB members now??

Have you considered getting funds through a grant programme like this one? Or asking for money on the Radio 4 appeal programme?.

On another note, if you can get someone to have a look at their website, maybe they could make the text size a bit bigger as it is really weeny at the moment. Also they might consider having some 'real life stories' from parents who have benefitted from the milk bank service. Could they not get a link to their website from other breastfeeding websites such as the abm, nct, lll etc?

and finally (sorry am in brain emptying mode here), this is a total long shot, but Innocent smoothies give quite a lot of money to charity. See their big knit campaign for Help the Aged. OK, so I'm getting carried away seeing lots of knitted baby hats, or even knitted boobs, but you get my drift.

Ooh my cousin works for Innocent, I could ask her who to contact. If you like?
Also what about slots on things like woman's hour on radio4, or doing a milk bank stunt that raises awareness (e.g. Big group of us do the moonwalk in london dressed as milk bottles or something!)

Ooooh knitted boobs on innocent bottles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YES!!

Lots of places to experiences like parachute jumps for charity. Basically there's a fee to the company organising it, so the individual has to raise more funds than the fee (£300-£400). Example here

Example of an a-z of fundraising ideas

Oh great stuff, thanks grumpy.

biggle we think we have a contact at Innocent so will see how that goes, but absolutely, totally loving the knitted boob idea! Wouldn't it be fab if they went for that!

Can anyone else give some feedback (be brutal, I need to know) about the current website, and what you'd like to see on there?

Right, I'm getting a good list together.

So grateful to you all. Do keep any ideas coming my way and please do give me some critique of the website as it stands.

Cheers all :)

Incidentally, Beveridge, I looked into the jumping out of perfectly servicable aeroplanes idea and I think that could be perfectly possible, too.

Scary, but possible.

I'd love to help as I'm now outside the UK so can't donate. Will happily write copy for websites/template letters. I'm shit at the design part though...

Have bookmarked site to critique later.

Would a breastpump manufacturer get involved? Maybe providing a batch of pumps to get mums started expressing? Or just by including a bit in the literature/putting a sticker on the box?

Thanks fraktious :)

Ardo do already support UKAMB actually, but I did look into the leaflet in box thing. Problem is that most companies like Medela break the WHO code, so we can't associate with them. However, Ardo have brought out personal pumps so I may go back to that idea.

occ, you could also post this in chat or somewhere and ask people for thoughts on the website and fundraising ideas. Sure lots of people who don't necessarily read this topic would have valuable feedback.

I think fraktious has a good idea about the pumps. One Mum I spoke to about donating was keen, but was put off by the thought of having to go out and buy a pump and a steriliser.

I think the site just needs to be brought up to date a bit, perhaps some more pics and a clearer idea of what UKAMB do. It does seem from looking at their accounts that they really are working with very little budget and get no income from grants so I can see why they don't have a fundraising co-ordinator or web designer or events manager.

A piece on womans hour would be a good idea I think, there isn't much awareness in the general public about donor milk at all if you ask me.

You could ask people wh

You could ask people who no longer BF to donate old sterilisers (presumably microwave ones would be okay to switch between users) or old manual pumps and any unused bags. Manual pumps are okay to switch between users as well, aren't they? Is it worth it even if the mother can only express a little occasionally? I can get about 4oz in half an hour with a manual, less time in the morning if DS didn't feed overnight, but if I donated that would it make a difference hypothetically? Half an hour with a manual is okay on the wrists and it might get people started.

I think it's important to take a multi-pronged approach. What are the barriers to people donating, how can more funds be raised and how can awareness be raised?

Some brainstorming:

Barriers to donation

• expense of pump/equipment
• starting too late
• distance from bank
• expense of bags/containers?

Cash
-sponsored events

Publicity

• NCT
• stickers on pumps
• LLL
• midwives
• volunteers

Getting posters up in gp practices would be great. Preferably ads with stories from grateful mums who other mums to know how they can help, perhaps also saying they didn't know about milk banks before theirkidwas born. When yr pg these things are all of interest. And would reach lots of mums that way.

lots of great ideas here. Think raising awareness is really important. Womans hour and r4 appeal would be great. I could see it appealing to something like the one show too...

A milk banker here - I usually lurk, listen and learn and try not to interfere in milk bank related threads - but I want you to know that I love you all for your fab ideas and supportive comments. Also that UKAMB, hand in hand with other organisations like BfN, ABM, NCT, LLL have made great strides in getting the message across to mothers that they can donate. So much so that quite a few milk banks are wondering how to squeeze all the fabulous donations of milk into their overflowing freezers. No complaints - its a far better problem than the one we used to have of not enough milk... But what is desperately needed now is to raise awareness that mothers want their baby to have donated breastmilk if they can't produce enough or any of their own (especially in the very early days) and especially if the baby is very premature or very sick. Please ask your midwife, health visitor, GP, neonatologist etc why some premature babies automatically get access to donor milk and others wouldn't get so much as a sniff of it. Parent power will make all the difference. We (at UKAMB) want DBM to be safe (which is why we spend the money we raise on providing training for milk bank staff as well as spreading the word and increasing awareness) and we want babies to receive it according to priority of need and not location of birth. A national milk bank service will happen I am sure but at the moment we are largely limited to local, NHS funded services (one MB is also heavily charitably funded) and very little in the way of strategic joined up planning. Things are changing though. Transporting milk is getting easier in some areas (thanks to the SERV and Freewheelers Blood Bikers) and UKAMB continues to be the key to progress. If you decide to jump out of a plane or undertake some other venture in aid of UKAMB and our aim for equal access to donor milk you will help to turn an aspiration into a reality and (to misquote Winston Churchill), put (donor) milk into the mouths of babies!

Just remembered the Every Drop Counts song too - its an anthem to breastmilk donors ('people like you make people like me worthwhile') and was totally donated by a very lovely West London singer songwriter called Sedleigh to help raise funds for UKAMB. You can get an MP3 by donating a few pounds (minimum £2 I think) here: www.ukamb.org/edc/index.html or a CD posted to you by donating a bit more. I'll work at getting donor milk stories onto the website.

Hello lurker lady

Here's the link to Sedleigh's song: www.ukamb.org/edc/index.html

everydropcounts- good that you've come along for the discussion.

Can you just clarify though- do you mean that women know about donated bm for their babies but aren't offered it or that they don't know that such a thing exists?

I'd love to donate milk, but there are NO milk banks in the south west or Wales.

I think lobbying MPs and writing to the PCT heads is probably the only way forward i can think of round here.

Even if mn can't run a campaign, they could at the least put some info into the pregnancy/breastfeeding information sections of the site.

does it ever get in local press? They love a human interest story and pic of cute baby....