Collection: Helping Hoodies

Being part of the UK’s fire and rescue service brings a deserved sense of pride and belonging – you really are part of a family – and that’s what inspired Phil Maynard, a now-retired Station Manager with West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service, to start his own charitable venture in August 2020. 

Phil began supplying badged hoodies to his colleagues, from firefighters to Control Room staff and immediate family members.  

The demand for these hoodies from other fire and rescue services quickly grew, so the non-for-profit organisation was established as a way to support the health and wellbeing of people working in the fire services community.

This inspirational idea has achieved remarkable results. Over 5,000 hoodies have been sold to date and, by donating 100% of profits from the sale of each hoodie to the charity, Phil’s managed to donate over £25,000 so far – an incredible amount.

The Charity shop team have now stepped in to support and continue to offer this fantastic product to The Fire and Rescue Family. As a nod to the hoodies' past, we have maintained the Helping hoodies logo  "BOA ME NA ME MMOA WO"  "Help me and let me help you"  and all profits from the sales of the hoodies will still be donated to the charity. 

If you can not yet see your Fire and Rescue Service badge on the website, this will mean that we have not yet had permission from your brigade to use your badge on the hoodies. The best way to help us speed this up is to drop your internal communications team an email asking for them to grant the charity permission to do so, as we would be happy to provide badged hoodies to all of our UK-based FRS.