Pennies and K3 Retail partnership wins Best Charity Initiative at EPA Awards

A partnership between fintech charity Pennies and retail technology company K3 Retail has won Best Charity Initiative at the 10th annual Emerging Payments Awards, held on 5 October 2017 in London.

K3 Retail, one of Pennies – the digital charity box – partners was recognised for enabling over 1.5M consumer digital donations (so far) through high street brands such as Hobbycraft.

The Pennies option-to-donate sits inside K3 Retail’s payment technology, and provides a quick and anonymous way to ‘feel-good’ as you give a few digital pence, by rounding-up or topping-up on a purchase.

Alison Hutchinson CBE, CEO of Pennies said:

“We are thrilled to be recognised for our partnership with K3 Retail with the Best Charity Initiative Emerging Payments Award. Pennies is now 7 years old – and heading towards supporting an incredible 45M small-change digital donations to date – half of which were collected in the last two years alone.

“Together with our partners, including K3 Retail, Pennies has unlocked over £10M of extra income for over 200 UK registered charities. Momentum continues to build around this affordable way to give as part of everyday shopping.”

Denise Davidson, Charity Advocate at K3 Retail adds, “Through Pennies we are enabling technology for good. We are very proud to make this incredibly simple and effective method of donation as widely available as possible, we’ve been on an incredible journey with Pennies and achieving this award really is the icing on the cake”.

Dominic Jordan, Operations Director at Hobbycraft said, “We first piloted Pennies, via K3 Retail, in 2016 and following a great customer response we rolled out to 89 outlets around the country. For us, Pennies has been a fantastic way to extend our commitment to our long-standing charity partner Together for Short Lives.

“In fact in under six months, when only half our stores had Pennies, we raised £100,000 through our customers’ generous donations – and improved engagement with shoppers, employees and the local community.”

Pennies is live over 50 partners across the retail, hospitality, leisure and service sectors and operates in the UK, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. By the end of 2017, Pennies will be available in around 5,000 physical stores (not including where it is available online or in-app).

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Notes to Editors
For more information, please contact Rob Dyson, Head of Marketing and Communications at Pennies on 07813 091 970 / rob.dyson@pennies.org.uk.

About Pennies
Pennies’ micro-donations are anonymous – personal data-free, quick, and a choice every time. The retailer nominates the charity that its customers can support. No data is collected, and there is no follow up; it really is about dropping a few pence in a charity box – but without physical cash.
Currently someone in the UK donates using Pennies every 3 seconds.
By the end of 2017, Pennies will be available in around 5,000 physical stores (not including where it is available online or in-app).
100% of Pennies customer donations go to charity – 90% to the retailers’ nominated charity/ies and 10% to Pennies – also a charity – to grow micro-donating movement.