Request MN Towers - Breastfeeding Calendar for Developing Countries?

[ruty]

I dropped MN Towers an email, but just putting it here in for everyone, including Justine and co. In light of NetMums acceptance of Nestle sponsorship and the resulting threads about it here, i was wondering if we could do something positive to counteract the aggressive marketing of formula to developing countries.
One idea might be a calendar, made up of Mnetters who are currently breastfeeding [they could be shot so anonymity doesn't have to be totally lost if need be], maybe sponsored by a nice company with donations to Save the Children. And perhaps with a bit of publicity we could get the calendar distributed to maternity hospitals in places like Bangladesh.

Any thoughts? Anyone with the right background to help out/advise?

thanks...

The mosaic idea is a very good one, especially if we could use photos Mnetters have already, their favourites as you say. Now how do we go about compiling them. Postcards might work, mightn't, they? And there could be a little 'No to Nestle logo', or would that be too much?

I'd do a pic too
(DS is 10 weeks)

Great Mrs JC. Anyone else want to send a pic in of them bfeeding, rather than having to pose for a shot?

I was thinking that the main pic would be of a baby being BF (it say on the mosaic website that it works best if the main image is a cose up of a face), but all the little pics would be just of babies faces - not sure if the 1000 tiny pics would work if they were each of a mum bfing - I thnk they would be too small and you wouldn't see what they were of.

Also, I think the final size of the 'product' would need to be fairly large (A4? I don't know) - so that you can see each individual picture. So I'm not sure that postacards will work. Have a look at the mosaic link and you'll see what I mean.

Pearhaps a greeting card would work (ie, folded - with the image in landscape, over the whole piece of card, front and back IYSWIM? - So when you fold it flat you see the whole picture), or is there something else anyone can think of that could have a larger picture on it (wall planner, as somebody sugested?).

I think it would really work best as a poster, but who would buy them, and what would people do with them? They'd be great in clinics etc, but its not much of a fund raiser - giving posters away to clinics!

I like the idea someone (Mrs A?) had about having a catchy line about babies of all walks of life having BF in common:

1000 babies have one thing in common.
We were all breastfed.
(Mmmmmmm! Thanks Mum!)

I don't know, advertising probably isn't my calling! But that sort of thing.

Maybe a postcard would still work - maybe the individual photos of babies don't have to be very big - so that you would have to study it carefully to make out each image. and then you could have the tagline 'what do all these babies have in common' and the answer on the back. And the individual photos were of babies, but the big photo was of a baby on the breast. Does that make sense? But they would probably have to be distributed around free of charge...

I guess we'd have to get in touch with the company which does the mosaics (and I'm sure there must be othrs) and find out how big the final image has to be to make it work. It was just that the example picture on the link is quite big, but the little photos are quite small - some of them you can't really tell what the pic is of.

I still like the idea of post/note cards too, and they would be the sort of thing I would send to friends as I thnk the final image would look clever and arty and beautuful. But I'm just not sure of the size thing.

yes you're probably right about the size thing Apostrophe. but i do like the postcard idea [so usable and great for awareness raising but not so great for fundraising] Any more ideas?

Maybe a t-shirt? If people would buy it (and I daresay it wouldn't be cheap, as the printing would have to be pretty good quality for the little pics to show up), then it would serve double purpose - fund raising and awarness raising. Personally I would buy one with a large picture on the back, and a small slogan/emblem on the front - I'm not fond of Ts with a big picture on the front (not sure why!), but back is better for people to see it anyway.

We could sell it in a pack - T-shirt and 5 postccards and a poster to put up at your local clinic?

Would babymilk action sponsor? MN? Government health agncises? NHS? I know NOTHING about raising sponsorship, and as an expat have not much of an idew who to ask tbh. I guess we would need an amountb of money for start up costs.

nice idea. though not sure how many people would want to have a pic of a babe breastfeeding on a T shirt. It would be about the right size though. And good for fundraising with post cards tho you're right it probably wouldn't be that cheap...I suppose we could have a baby's face made up of smaller images of mothers breastfeeding children...Anyone else have an opinion on it?

wanted to add my support, still bfing dd 11months and willing to be photoraphed

Thanks pampam! Was wondering if the thread was running out of steam...will keep bumping it just in case! On hunker's petition thread there are some great examples of T shirts and stuff out there already - [a T shirt with 'mothersucker' on it. ]
We may not be allowed to use the Mumsnet name - it depends if Mumsnet endorsed it i suppose - but a calendar still may be the best option if we want to photograph Mnetters - maybe we should save it for next year [don't think the Nestle issue will be over by then ]