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Inclusion Sainsbury's Marketing

Sainsbury's becomes Signsbury's to include deaf shoppers in 150th birthday

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By John McCarthy, Opinion Editor

July 18, 2019 | 3 min read

As Sainsbury's celebrates its 150th birthday it has created an inclusive pop-up store for the deaf called Signsbury's in the hopes it will raise awareness about hard-of-hearing people and help the public better communicate with them.

Signsburys

Sainbury's becomes Signburies to include deaf shoppers in 150th birthday

The store in Bath has been made more accessible with the installation of visual guides and smart tech. Furthermore, staff at the store have been taught keywords and phrases in British Sign Language to greet guests. It hopes to also teach shoppers these signs.

The campaign was delivered by Gravity Road, Hope & Glory, and PHD and marks its '150 Days of Community' initiative.

In addition to the sign change, dynamic video screens were installed to teach sign language content for different words and phrases, including ‘milk’, ‘trolley’ and ‘bananas’.

Store manager Paul Robertson and his team, including deaf colleague Sam Book, suggested the effort as part of the 150 initiative. Signsbury's will be open for four days from 18 – 21 July.

Tim Fallowfield, company secretary and corporate services director for Sainsbury’s, said: “We’re really excited to be launching this Signsbury’s initiative at our store in Bath.

"We want to be the most inclusive retailer where people love to work and shop and it’s really important to us that we support both customers and colleagues with hearing difficulties to feel as comfortable as possible in our stores wherever we can.

“We’re really proud of Paul and the team at Bath who thought up this wonderful idea as part of our 150 Days of Community celebrations.”

Paul Robertson, store manager, at Sainsbury’s said: “The 150 Days of Community scheme was the perfect time to explore new ways to make our store more deaf-friendly.

"We have many hard of hearing customers in Bath and always want to make their experience as brilliant as possible, and we hope Signsbury’s will help better their time in store even more.”

Vote for the campaign below in The Drum's Creative Works.

Sainsburys: Signsburys by Gravity Road, PHD UK & Hope&Glory

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Inclusion Sainsbury's Marketing

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