Cadbury makes the “Easter Egg Hunt” inclusive for kids with a vision impairment

When you have kids out on Sunday morning looking through the garden and under the table for chocolate easter eggs, you probably don’t consider how that’s an activity that uses sight over all the other senses, and as such excludes those littlies with a vision impairment. For that – beloved chocolate brand Cadbury has an idea.

It’s not a consumer device or gadget you can buy, but surely the concept is such that it could be produced and used in future years for this very purpose.

To demonstrate, Cadbury held the first ever “accessible” Easter Egg hunt.

A bunch of kids who have never in their lives experienced the joy of finding an egg in an Easter hunt because it requires sight were given a small beacon to wear around their neck.

Hidden around the gardens were big Cadbury Eggs that were actually a gadget which could detect that a beacon was nearby and emit a sound the kids could hear and track to and find and grab the egg.

Of course, that hard boring gadget was then swapped out for a delicious Cadbury Easter Egg and the smiles were ear to ear.

Kathy De Lullo, Senior Marketing Manager at Cadbury said  “Having worked closely with The Royal Children’s Hospital’s Good Friday Appeal for years, we’ve seen the joy that holidays like Easter bring to children first hand. Upon recognising the logistics of an Easter egg hunt are harder for vision impaired children, we set out to make a change for the better, and hence engaged the team at FutureLabs to help us make Easter an accessible occasion for all,”

“Working closely with the FutureLabs team, we successfully trialled this technology at the first ever ‘accessible’ Easter egg hunt today. We were overwhelmed by the happiness and excitement on the faces of those who participated, and look forward to continuing on our mission to make Easter something that everyone can celebrate!”

The company worked with the team at Blind Citizens Australia to gain insights about what this means to the vision impaired community, Sally Aurisch, CEO of Blind Citizens Australia, said “We’re happy to see initiatives such as this, that help increase the accessibility of day-to-day life for people who are blind or vision impaired and bring awareness to the barriers that people with disability face every day. Through the creation of accessible events such as this, we can help break down these barriers and build communities where people who are blind or vision impaired can participate fully and equally.”

Mother of nine-year-old Sienna summed up the meaning of something like this to a child, saying “This event is an absolute game changer, not just for Sienna, but for all kids with additional needs worldwide. It has meant that Sienna can feel completely included with her peers; every year they get to do their Easter egg hunts, whether that be at school or with friends, but the inclusion of this new technology has meant she can feel like all the other kids at Easter time, an experience she’s not had to date. So, we’re very grateful to Cadbury for creating a more inclusive hunt this year.”

Having seen the impact this can have and the joy it can bring, Cadbury’s annual $100,000 donation to the Good Friday Appeal will directly support further research and development in the area of blindness and vision in Australia.

Rebecca Cowan, Executive Director of the Good Friday Appeal, says: “Cadbury has been a valued fundraising partner of the Good Friday Appeal since 2001, and in this time has raised over $1.8m through initiatives and donations such as our past Easter egg hunts and chocolate eggs and hampers for our volunteers and fundraisers.”

“We are thrilled to receive a generous donation once again of $100,000 from Cadbury this year and are so grateful for their ongoing support. The funding from Cadbury assists The Royal Children’s Hospital Ophthalmology department to have access to the latest equipment and technology with the upgrade of RETCAM, a vital tool used in screening for eye disease in newborns.”

Ok, I don’t mind a few days off the diet and on the Cadbury if the company is doing this:)