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Purple Tuesday 2019

6th November 2019

Garden Square Shopping Centre is proud to be supporting Purple Tuesday again, which takes place on the 12th November.

Purple Tuesday promotes the £2.25 trillion global spending power of disabled people and their families and calls on organisations to make changes to improve the customer experience for disabled individuals.

An International Call to Action

Purple Tuesday is an international call to action focused on changing the customer experience for disabled people. It calls on organisations from all sectors and sizes to take decisive practical actions to meet their needs.

Purple Tuesday has been developed by disability organisation Purple; which works alongside customer-facing businesses, helping them to make changes to improve the disabled customer experience.

Last year, the first ever Purple Tuesday was a huge success – with over 1,500 pledges from businesses to make concrete changes. This included commitments such as: staff training, digital audits, better signage and training of frontline staff in basic British sign language. Purple Tuesday gathered support from over 750 businesses – including Garden Square Shopping Centre.

Building on Achievements

Despite last year’s successes, there are still real (and perceived) barriers that make it hard for disabled people to find work, spend money online and in-store, and enjoy a drink or meal out. Purple Tuesday 2019 hopes to build on the work achieved last year and further increase awareness.

Exciting plans are underway amongst some of Britain’s leading retailers – chain and independent, large and small – for celebrating the awareness day. Disabled street-theatre, dance and choir performances, and more, are set to be staged across the UK’s favourite shopping hotspots.

Beyond Tuesday 12th November, Purple will work alongside organisations to support implementation of commitments made, including customer service training and providing support to increase accessibility of websites and other online technology. Wider support includes physical access audits, improved signage and increasing the involvement of disabled mystery shoppers.

Purple Tuesday at Garden Square

On Tuesday 12th November, Garden Square will be changing its logos on its website and social media pages to purple, in support of Purple Tuesday. A ‘not every disability is visible’ poster will be displayed in the centre’s accessible toilet and staff members will be wearing purple high visibility vests throughout the day with the Purple Tuesday ‘Can I help?’ logo on the back. Participating shops in Garden Square will also be turning their store music off between 10am-11am and 4pm-5pm to support customers who may have sensory needs such as Autism, ensuring all usual loud noises are removed.

The shopping centre has also:

  • Completed an online accessibility audit
  • Completed a site access audit of the centre’s physical space and made plans for improvement
  • Provided disability customer service training opportunities to frontline staff
  • Formalised a regular ‘quiet hour’

Mike Adams, CEO, Purple, says: “I am delighted that Garden Square is involved in Purple Tuesday. It underlines their public commitment to improve the customer experience for disabled people. Meeting the needs of disabled customers makes commercial sense for businesses and I am hopeful others will follow Garden Square’s lead. Together we can and commit to change the customer experience for disabled people for good.”

For more details about Purple Tuesday, click here.