30,000 professionals planned to leave the sport and physical activity industry when the pandemic hit. To support the British public back into sport once COVID restrictions lifted, the activity workforce needed to be retrained, so thousands of people could stay in, or return to the sector stronger.

Our solution

We built an app that matched training providers with employers to support the workforce through downtime and return with more skills post-pandemic.

ReTrain - the app - retools the sport and physical activity workforce to ensure sector continuity, resilience and a strong return to sport post-pandemic. Funded by the National Lottery through Sport England to rescue sport, ReTrain is part of CIMSPA's vision to support, develop and enable professionals and organisations to succeed, inspiring the UK to become more active. 

18,000

lockdown qualifications

including qualifications for swimming teachers, pool plant operators, gym instructors, personal trainers, sports coaches, health navigators and entry managers, supporting 100 employers across the UK.

How we did it:

From brief to MVP in one month

Speed was vital for CIMSPA in this project. When we started working on ReTrain, there was no government roadmap for reopening the nation. COVID-19 was five months old and nobody knew how things would move forward.

Sports professionals still needed to be upskilled before Britain was allowed to return to physical activity like they did before.

The ReTrain app took eleven weeks to think and create. We launched the MVP four weeks after receiving the initial brief, meaning CIMSPA were able to smash through their targets and deliver the project as planned.