Talking road safety? Say it with puppets

Life-sized puppets play a key role in a new road safety promotion jointly staged by Michelin and vehicle leasing/fleet managing company Arval. As part of its corporate social responsibilities, Arval is working with the tyre maker to get the road safety message across to teenagers near its Swindon head office. The puppet show will be presented to Swindon College and Royal Wootton Bassett Sixth Form in September.

Michelin has already presented the puppet show, by Steve Wright of The Puppet Broadcast Company, at 15 schools near its Stoke-on-Trent headquarters, and shares that it received “positive feedback from pupils and teachers.” In addition, the tyre maker treated attendees at a recent meeting of its Michelin Fleet Panel to a show, and it was here that Arval’s first exposed to the unique, life-sized puppets occurred.

“Business fleets account for a large proportion of the traffic on our roads, whether it’s company cars or grey fleet vehicles, so the industry as a whole has a responsibility to share road safety messages,” shared Tracey Scarr, Arval’s fleet and road safety manager. “At Arval, we take CSR very seriously and we are keen to promote the right messages, information and advice to the widest possible audience whenever we can.

“When Michelin presented the puppet show to us we were very impressed,” Scarr continued. “The puppeteer tackles key messages in an edgy and memorable way which teenagers will relate to and will hopefully make them think about their own driving habits. It is so important to make young people aware of the risks associated with driving and how to assess dangers effectively. This show complements the work that we already carry out in our local community and we had a very positive reaction from local schools when we proposed the idea. I would encourage other companies to get in touch with Michelin to see if they can make a difference in their local area too.”

Michelin’s key account manager for Arval, Paul Brady, added: “Arval is a very proactive company when it comes to road safety and CSR, both with its employees and its local community. The puppet show is a refreshing and powerful way to encourage the future generation of drivers to be safe on Britain’s roads and it is encouraging to see fleets such as Arval keen to be involved with this initiative.”

Michelin invites those interested in working with Michelin to promote road safety to young people to contact Corinne Li on 01782 402371 or email corinne.li@uk.michelin.com.