The Guide Dogs For The Blind Association

Guide Dogs is best known for its iconic guide dogs, helping people get out and about with confidence, going wherever school, work or play takes them – and knowing that sight loss won't hold them back.

But that's not all. Guide Dogs has a range of other services, with and beyond its dogs. It provides the advice and skills that give people with sight loss the freedom to live life on their own terms.

Since 2018, players of People's Postcode Lottery have been helping Guide Dogs to transform lives through numerous projects and core services. Players are supporting:

• The lifetime of a litter of nine guide dog puppies. With each extraordinary guide dog partnership lasting around eight years, the nine puppies will go on to provide a combined 72 years of mobility and independence for their owners!

• The recruitment and training of more Training and Behaviour Advisors, and Guide Dog Mobility Specialists. These roles will help Guide Dogs accelerate their capacity to train more dogs so that more people with sight loss can benefit from a life-changing guide dog partnership

• The re-development of four purpose-built regional centres and a hub site. These centres will enable Guide Dogs to expand their services and reach, in order to help more people with sight loss throughout the UK

• The development of the Guide Dogs chatbot and Alexa Skill. These will help Guide Dogs extend their reach and provide information and advice to people with vision impairment through new digital channels

• The Guide Dogs buddy dog service throughout 2022. Buddy dogs bring a canine friend into the lives of children with sight loss, helping them to build confidence and trust

This year, players are supporting the very beginning of the guide dog puppies' lives. Funding will go towards all the equipment and staffing needed to care for the incredible guide dog mums as they bring their puppies into the world. The puppies are looked after with their mum until they are ready to leave the litter at seven weeks old. They are taken to the Guide Dogs National Centre for their health checks, assessments, microchips, vaccinations and worming treatments. They then venture off to their new puppy raiser families to begin their journey towards becoming life-changing guides.

To find out more about how Guide Dogs is transforming the lives of people with sight loss visit their website (opens in new tab).