Overview

The Optimised Retrofit (OR) pathfinder project is one of a number of Welsh Government backed retrofit projects in Wales, designed to drive forward innovation and best practice around home decarbonisation.

Phae 1 saw the collaboration of 68 partners, including 26 social housing providers, awarded more than £13m in funding by Welsh Government to retrofit more than 1,700 homes across Wales.

What we did

As communications partner for the programme, Grasshopper provided strategic communications and dissemination activity on behalf of the OR umbrella; including hosting regular Communication Steering Group meetings, creating a communications handbook and asset library for partners, managing project social channels and website, implementing a media relations programme, and engaging with industry stakeholders and political representatives.

Grasshopper has also worked with University College London to test behaviours and refine messaging and narrative, to tackle the challenges of getting residents signed up to retrofit.

Work was also undertaken to engage with SMEs and tradespeople to help address the skills gap and build the retrofit supply chain, including delivering events in collaboration with Business Wales and Sell2Wales.

Outcome

As well as helping raise the profile of the work being undertaken by the OR project across Wales and at a UK level, Grasshopper completed work on testing resident messaging, supported by the UCL behavioural science team, to underpin resident communications moving forward.