Continuing the festivities, on the 13th December, MVIS and Bartco UK took part in Christmas Jumper Day!

Raising money for the homeless, members of the team donated between £1 and £3 for the cause, helping to bring a  little bit of happiness to vulnerable people this Christmas whilst bringing festive cheer to the office.

Everyone took part in this fun excuse to wear those warm, comfortable jumpers that only come out this time of year, even Levi the French Bulldog! But between me and you, some of the team got into the spirit early and have been practising Christmas Jumper Day for a number of days in the lead up to today, ensuring that they looked their best and made a real effort to impress.

The ‘winner’ of Christmas Jumper Day here was almost certainly one of our new starters, Liam, who donned an elf costume and a Santa hat in a hilarious show of this fun side of himself. Liam wins even more points for his outfit considering he is one of Bartco UK’s Workshop Technicians, really bringing the costume to life.

Whilst Christmas Jumper Day is a bit of light-hearted fun for us here at MVIS and Bartco UK, it must be remembered that we are doing this for a very real and serious reason. Homelessness is no joke, especially during a time that is supposed to be about family and feature a little bit of ‘overindulgence’ – a luxury the homeless don’t tend to have. So, at a time of the year that is universally known as the ‘time of giving’, it is appropriate for us to give back to the community and do what we can for this worthy cause.

This isn’t the only community initiative that we have on the go this Christmas however. As a socially responsible organisation, we have numerous projects taking place this year that will help several sections of society. Stay tuned for more information on these, as they come to fruition throughout the remainder of December.

Edit: For Christmas Jumper Day 2019, the MVIS and Bartco UK team raised £37.50. A big thanks to everyone who took part – every penny donated to Centrepoint Homeless Charity counts! 

With all the markets and events taking place up and down the country at Christmas, we are entering a very busy time for MVIS. However, we are never too busy to make sure we are doing our bit. For a number of years, MVIS have donated VMS-As in aid of Buxton’s 5K Jingle Bell Jog, and this year was no exception. In addition to this, 2 of our MVIS office team, Mizzy and Tom all took time out of their weekend to participate in the event, taking us into the Christmas period as we intend to continue; with generosity, hard work and of course lots of laughs. 

The arduous task of completing this 5k run on such a cold Sunday morning was made all the more impressive knowing that our team raised money individually for Blythe House Hospice Care,  a charity that offers free, individualised, holistic care and support for anyone in the High Peak living with cancer or other serious, life-limiting illness. The run itself involved participants running, walking, dancing, prancing, jogging or jingling their way around Buxton’s Pavilion Gardens to raise the funds for Blythe House Hospice Care. 

A fantastic day was had by everyone, with all those taking part going at their own pace. The important thing in these events is not where you finish, but taking part. It’s an old cliche but one that rarely has as much meaning as in this case. The very act of signing up for a physical challenge like this is easier for some than for others, but actually taking part is another accolade in itself, one that our team and everyone involved should be very proud of themselves for. 

Blythe House Hospice Care are already promoting next year’s event. If you want to find out how you can do your bit, or for any more information about the 2020 Buxton Jingle Jog, visit their website and be sure to make the most out of the early bird sign up discount! 

Road Safety Week takes place this year from 18th – 24th November and is organised by road safety charity, Brake. The annual occasion is the biggest road safety awareness event in the UK, with thousands of companies, organisations, educational institutions and wider communities taking part in road safety demonstrations, exciting events and information screenings, all with the focus of raising road safety awareness.

During Road Safety Week, the police often take the opportunity to conduct roadside checks of vehicles in order to highlight the importance of keeping your vehicle properly maintained, offering advice to drivers and running speed checks on traffic, with the message that speeding is a major cause of accidents and contributes to more deaths on the road than is acceptable.

Few causes mean as much to MVIS as road safety, being a central foundation for our business. Many of our ITS products are designed specifically with road safety in mind, covering road works, traffic management, speed enforcement and other general road safety concerns. What’s more is that not only does our business surround the importance of road safety, but so do our team’s lives, who are often required to go out into the field on highways up and down the country to conduct maintenance on our units.

With this in mind, it is of extreme importance to us that our own company vehicles are maintained properly, and this week marks a perfect prompt to run even more thorough checks on our vehicles than usual. Vehicle safety is an aspect we do not take lightly anyway, even on a normal day, with the company requiring our delivery drivers to perform daily and driver change fleet checks on all vehicles with no exception. However, during Road Safety Week, the MVIS team take this opportunity to do tremendously thorough checks that go above and beyond the already strict requirements.

Ensuring that all vehicle, road safety and first aid equipment is present and in working order, MVIS vehicles are certain to have had checks on their brakes, lights, tires, water, oil and other fluids, all as part of a list of 63 checks that employees must check daily before they can leave our premises.

You can do your part for Road Safety Week yourself in many ways, such as fundraising for or donating to the road safety charity Brake, or by simply doing stringent checks on your vehicles, business or personal.

For more information about Road Safety Week, check out their website.