How Your Purchases With Us Help Others
Our Ambleside shop was opened by local climber and Mountain Rescue Team member Frank Davies in 1959 and we are extremely proud to continue his legacy of selling the best range of technical outdoor equipment we can.
As he built the business on Compston Corner, Frank had the vision to place the ownership of our shop premises to a charitable trust; originally called the Frank Davies Trust, committed to the prevention of poverty, advancement of education and lifesaving health improvement.
Now known as the El Rio Foundation, Frank’s family ensure our rent payment is split among charities that uphold these principles including Water Aid and Doug Scott’s charity Community Action Nepal. Our close link with CAN continues with a corner of the shop permanently given to selling Nepali handicrafts and signed prints of Doug’s mountain photo’s, every penny from these sales go directly to fund the UK arm of the charity so that more schools and hospitals can be built in Nepal.
However, there is an equally important sector of the Trust based in Colombia. the charity arm of the award winning Rio hostel, Buritaca run by Franks son Ben. Ever since its inception, the plan was always for the hostel to have a hugely positive impact in the local community. Prior to opening in 2017, Ben and Guy (the owners) set up community English lessons and a small recycling and waste management project, which grew to involve the majority of local hostels and hotels on the northern Colombia Caribbean coast. In 2019, they sponsored a Community Jungle school (providing year-round education to nine children with no access to any other formal education) and started to run sports sessions in the local town. The growing community work of the hostel was sadly interrupted by the Covid pandemic, however, they were able to send out 1000 food packages to help local families with the support of Viva Air and other local hostels.
With the success of the hostel’s community work, the Foundation was formalised in June 2020. And post Covid, when face to face activities were once again possible, the Foundation started to expand. In September 2021, they ran one football session and one multi-sports session a week involving 55 children from one community. Within 15 months, they were running 20+ sports and arts clubs and now work with 550 children each week across seven communities!
But why are they needed?
During the pandemic, children didn’t go to school in the area for 21 months. Many children still really struggle with their reading, writing and maths as well as core every-day skills like concentration, team-working and communication. Even now school is back up and running, there is not enough funding to provide a teacher for every class so if one teacher goes to the dentist, three grades are off school for the day. Class sizes are also very large, adding to the all-round challenging learning environment.
With limited money for teachers, schools also really struggle to provide the additional support many children need. Children with significant challenges in their home lives have very limited options for accessing external advice or support. The El Rio Foundation provide a full-time psychologist who works with individual children, the teaching team and their parents/support network to create tailored plans for pupils with the most challenging behaviour.
The impact of the recent 55-year Colombian civil war and continued political unrest also continue to cause a whole range of socio-economic issues for local people:
‘The Troncal del Caribe has been an area impacted by violence, and the inability of the state to assist vulnerable populations has meant the Foundation plays a key role in providing spaces for community building and learning opportunities for 550+ local children every week.’
Daniel Maldonado, El Rio Foundation community activities lead
Last year over a thousand hostel guests volunteered adding positivity and joy to the local community. Maybe you could head to Columbia to join them, or, the next time you need a new piece of outdoor clothing or equipment - you could buy it from us. The money you spend with us in our shop makes the work of the team at the El Rio Foundation possible.
Thank you.
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