One Year No Beer launches crowdfunding campaign to scale amid major rise in alcohol related deaths
One Year No Beer (OYNB), an online toolkit which supports people to reduce or eliminate alcohol consumption to help them to live happier, healthier, and more fulfilled lives, has launched a crowd-funding campaign to raise £500,000. The new investment be will used to continue OYNB’s global growth, enhance its app technology, and further scale its lifestyle support system which facilitates sustained behavioural changes, through the power of community and connection.
The latest fund raise follows research showing Covid-19 restrictions are having a detrimental impact on public mental health. In May last year, OYNB commissioned a nationwide YouGov survey focused on individuals’ mental health and wellbeing across the UK. The results revealed that 40% of the population were concerned about declining mental health due to lockdown measures. Key factors identified as having a negative impact on mental health were fear of catching COVID-19 (35%), lack of daily structure (30%), feelings of lack of control (30%) and loneliness (25%).
These findings coincide with new data from Public Health England showing a rise in drinking and alcohol-related deaths since Covid lockdown measures came into effect. The organisation reported a 21% rise in alcoholic liver deaths in England between 2019 and 2020 with an additional 12.6m extra litres of alcohol sold in shops and supermarkets in that period.
OYNB was launched as a free service in 2015, by Founder Ruari Fairbairns, who decided to take a break from alcohol following enormous social, peer and corporate pressures. After realising the effects were life-changing, he decided to help others improve their relationship with alcohol.
The company so far raised over £1.8m from more than 500 investors including ex-Facebook director Mark Cowan; CEO and founder of Spartan and Death Race, Joe De Sena; and former global head of mergers and acquisitions at HSBC, Alain Renaud. OYNB now has more than 80,000 members in 137 countries across the globe and has generated over £2.2m in revenue with 85% growth in its Alcohol-Free Challenge sales between February and June this year.
Ruari Fairbairns, Founder at One Year No Beer, said: “We’re delighted to launch this latest crowd-funding round and we continue our global mission to help people change their relationship with alcohol and effect other positive behaviour changes, through the power of online community and connection. The funds will further support scaling of the business including the development of native IOS and Android Apps which will make our service easily accessible to a wider audience.
“With over 80,000 members in 137 countries, our community continues to support our core mission remains focused on reducing individuals’ alcohol consumption and addressing negative habits through various behavioural science and positive psychology programmes.
“With research showing the detrimental impact of Covid restrictions on mental health and a significant rise in alcohol consumption as well as alcohol-related deaths, there’s a growing need both in the UK and across other parts of the world for the benefits of our programme.”
