Wacky Warehouse, the UK’s leading soft play, party venue and activity centre, has relaunched its school uniform donation scheme for a second successive year due to national demand.

Parents and guardians are invited to visit their local Wacky Warehouse to donate any unused or pre-loved school uniform over the summer months ahead of the new school year.

The charitable initiative follows new research revealing 45% of parents and guardians will struggle to pay for their child’s new uniform this year, up from four in ten parents (40%) in 2023.

What’s more, two thirds of caregivers (66%) say school uniform is the costliest expense around the back to school season, with an average spend on uniform of £161 per child.

According to the study, this is compounded by parents replacing an average of seven items of clothing a year, with shoes (28%), trousers (16%), and shirts (15%) cited as the costliest expenses.

As part of Wacky Warehouse’s scheme, items including blazers, shirts, trousers, skirts, and lots more, will be collected through and donated to local partner charities or schools nominated by each site.

To represent the size of the issue, and significant struggles of parents and guardians across the UK, the brand has created a giant mural of a child in school uniform, made from hundreds of kid’s uniform pieces that will form the first donation at Wacky Warehouse’s ‘Donation Stations’ across the nation.

The 15-foot mural is featured alongside Daniel Arsham’s artwork Bronze Eroded Bunny at the iconic Yorkshire Sculpture Park, made from uniform items of various sizes, which will all be donated as a means of kickstarting the national drive heading into the summer holidays.

To donate, simply take your pre-loved school uniform to your nearest Wacky Warehouse across 65 sites and drop it in the designated donation station between 3 June and 2 September.

For more about the Wacky Warehouse school uniform donation scheme and to view participating sites, visit: wackywarehouse.co.uk