We’re proud that Pledgeball is backed by science. 

Research is integral to Pledgeball, both to assess its impact and to inform its work.

When Pledgeball launched with its pilot club, Whitehawk FC, in September 2020, (then) masters student Jenny Amann completed her thesis on the potential of mobilising football fans and the impact of Pledgeball, whilst interned to (now) trustee, Dr Mark Doidge.

This research demonstrated the enormous potential of Pledgeball to instigate change.

The numbers speak for themselves: just 1 Wembley’s worth of fans simply reducing their shower time to 5 minutes saves the same amount of CO2e as taking over 6,000 cars off the road.

Small individual changes can snowball into massive wider societal change.

There are wider impacts beyond the direct individual change. Each time a Pledgeballer tells someone else about the changes they’re making, that person is encouraged to make a change as well, because they can see its impact. 

Each time a Pledgeballer shops sustainably, they persuade businesses to operate more sustainably. When a community shows it cares, politicians and organisations have no choice but to make sustainable decisions.

Pledgeball continues to be informed by monitoring and evaluation and by the many scientists they have and continue to work with.