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About the campaign

Hosted by Marmalade Trust

What is Loneliness Awareness Week?

Loneliness Awareness Week is a week dedicated to raising awareness of loneliness. It's all about creating supportive communities by having open, honest conversations. Loneliness is a natural human emotion - we are hardwired to need social connections. By talking about it, we can support ourselves and others.

The campaign centres on a powerful message which resonates with many. We've trended on Twitter, reached 271.5 million people in one week with the campaign, and each year we've seen tens of thousands of organisations, charities and individuals get involved, including the Royal Family, the Prime Minister, Mayor of London, NHS trusts, and all Government departments.

Who runs the campaign?

Marmalade Trust is a leading loneliness charity offering support for all ages, dedicated to raising awareness of loneliness and empowering people to make connections. We launched Loneliness Awareness Week in 2017 and it grows in momentum each year across the UK and internationally.

What can the campaign achieve?

Loneliness Awareness Week is vital in increasing awareness and understanding of loneliness and we can create a more connected society.

Whilst we’re seeing an increase in discussion on the subject, stigma remains and some key misconceptions still need to be challenged. Ask anyone to picture a lonely person and most will imagine an older person living on their own. As such, we often rebuke and dismiss feelings of loneliness because ‘that doesn’t apply to me’.

By identifying and acknowledging all the times that we have personally felt and experienced loneliness, we can start to change our viewpoint, accept it and understand how to take action to manage the feeling (and our social connections) in the future.

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What sort of things happen during the week?

So much happens during Loneliness Awareness Week, the only limit is imagination! From coffee mornings and book clubs to walking clubs and art workshops, to neighbourhood bake sales and speed friending.

There are designated chatty tables in cafes and pubs, businesses putting loneliness on their meeting agenda, radio stations having honest and open conversations about loneliness, laughter yoga, swing dancing, shared office lunches and cook-offs.

Thousands of pounds have been raised in the last seven years during Loneliness Awareness Week and thousands of people have connected to share stories and conversations that reduce stigma and raise awareness.

Previous campaigns

Marmalade Trust launched Loneliness Awareness Week in 2017 and it grows in momentum each year across the UK and internationally. Here are a few of the highlights...

2023

Connection Matters

In 2023 our campaign centred on the importance of connection. We were thrilled to have worked with representatives worldwide to create supportive communities and spread our messaging further. We reached 268 million people, our hashtag trended on Twitter and 1,500+ connection-building events were held. We partnered with neighbourhood app Nextdoor on groundbreaking research, as well as other fantastic organisations. 86% of people felt more valued and connected as a result of the campaign!

2021

We get lonely

In 2021 we highlighted the importance of building a greater awareness and acceptance of loneliness. We reached over 100 million people of all ages took all over the world. We partnered with Direct2Florist on a campaign called ‘Lonely Bouquets’, where over 900 florists left bouquets in their local community. Those lucky enough to find one passed them on to show kindness. Royal Mail once again supported our campaign, printing a postmark on all stamped mail during the week.

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2020

One Less Lonely Voice

Due to the global coronavirus pandemic, we hosted a virtual campaign to raise awareness of loneliness. On the first day of the campaign, conversations about loneliness were happening every 2.6 seconds and our hashtag trended all day. We reached around 271.5 million people – all without leaving our homes. We saw almost 20,000 charities, organisations, companies and individuals get involved online, including the Royal Family, Boris Johnson, Mayor of London, NHS trusts and all Government departments.

2019

We kicked off with the launch of the #LetsTalkLoneliness campaign in collaboration with The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). Our founder and CEO, Amy Perrin, spent the day in London meeting MP’s and charities to discuss the importance of opening up a dialogue about loneliness in order to reduce the stigma attached to it. On day one conversations about loneliness taking place every 5 seconds, and #LetsTalkLoneliness was trending for 10 hours. 800 events took place across the UK, from coffee mornings and book clubs, to walking clubs and art workshops.

2018

The response to our second-ever Loneliness Awareness Week was incredible. Across the country, people of all ages got involved with the campaign and raise awareness of loneliness. We supported 252 events across the UK - from talks in businesses to group walks with dogs. We were featured in the local and national press, from our founder and CEO Amy Perrin being interviewed on ITV to Marmalade Trust and Loneliness Awareness Week being featured in publications from The Telegraph to Female First to the Daily Mail and Bristol Evening Post.

2017

We pioneered the first-ever Loneliness Awareness Week campaign to reduce the stigma of loneliness and to empower everyone to talk more openly about it. It took our founder, Amy, and a couple of volunteers just 6 weeks to launch. We initiated the ‘#LetsTalkLoneliness’ movement (since adopted by the government). We held a film premiere of Lorna, and we were featured on BBC Points West and BBC Radio Bristol. We interviewed people on the street, videoed short clips of children talking about what loneliness means to them and ran school workshops on the subject. Little did we know how much the campaign would grow!

2022

That Lonely Feeling

Loneliness Awareness Week continued to grow, and we noticed a positive shift in the way people talk about loneliness. Our 2022 campaign focused on the many and varied times in life when we experience loneliness, to drive awareness that loneliness is something that affects us all. We reached 50 million people with our campaign. It was brilliant to be part of Eden Project Communities #MonthOfCommunity.

2024

Random Acts of Connection

Our theme encouraged everyone to increase those simple, everyday moments of connection which help us feel happier and less lonely.

It was fantastic to see over 3,000 connection-building activities take place across the UK and around the world. Our campaign reached 638,000 people across the UK and globally on social media, the campaign hashtag trended on X. 87% of people told us they had started a conversation with someone new about loneliness during the week. Read more >