Chicken Out!

This Post was written by Scott from RealEpicurean

Hi all,
Happy New Year! Most of you might have already seen the email I'm about to post, but for those that haven't, take note please...

Dear Friend of River Cottage,

Here’s a quick reminder that our new River Cottage series, Hugh’s Chicken Run starts tonight (Monday 7th Jan) at 9pm. We are really excited over the next three days that we can really drive this campaign hard.

So far, we've got over 19,000 sign-ups before the show has even aired, so it’ll be great to see how far we can push this. We’ve got loads of celebrity support too including Rosie Boycott, Jamie Oliver, Bill Oddie, Jonathan Ross and even the Chickens of Aardman Animations ‘Chicken Run’! Who are all helping to spread the campaign to the widest possible audience. A full list can be seen here.

You may well also of seen plenty of press activity too, with major pieces in the Independent, Sunday Times and Saturday Mail. The RSPCA and Compassion In World Farming have all made their own direct pleas to get this top of the publics new years wish list.

But there’s still more you can help us with, if you’ve not already, please help...

1. Sign Up! Please.

2. Send the campaign to all your friends, family and colleagues – get them to sign up and get them to pass it on to their address list too

You can do that easily by either forwarding this mail or go to our send to a friend feature.

3. Display our campaign banner(s) and ‘pledgometer’ on your website, facebook pages or blogs, or hassle website owners to do so, or tell us where we should be putting them – the pledgometers are all linked together so they will all count into the same total, the more running the better!

Please see here for details of how to add the bannners to your site. Website suggestions to campaign@chickenout.tv.

4. Ask your local free-range poultry supplier to display one of our posters – available here and upload your free-range supplier to the list at www.freerangereview.com.

For full show details please here.

Once again, many thanks, we hope you enjoy the shows

Hugh and the River Cottage Team.

Chicken Out!

This Post was written by Sarah from Eating Britain


Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and River Cottage have just launched a campaign called Chicken Out! Their wish is to change the way chicken is mass produced in this country and encourage people like you and me to buy free-range chicken and eggs. In Britain we consume over 850 million chickens each year and 95% of those are intensively farmed. The campaign aims to acquire at least half a million signatures of support, which will then be sent to governing bodies and supermarkets to demonstrate public and consumer feelings on this subject, and hopefully set a change in the way chicken and eggs are produced in Britain.

I think this is a very worthy campaign and with enough support I believe it could really make a difference. Supermarkets have already taken notice of our desire to eat more organic and locally sourced food, so they will have no choice but to take these views into account too. I have signed-up in support of the Chicken Out! campaign on the website and I've already printed the campaign poster which I'll be posting on the notice board at work and anywhere else I can think of!

If you'd like to know more about the campaign, take a look at this personal message from Hugh and then, if you wish, visit the website and add your support.

What better place to encourage support for this campaign, here at the UK Food Bloggers Association.

Consumer opinion does make a difference, so have your say and help to make a change!