Bauer Media Outdoor works with TBWA\MCR and children's Community Interest Company (CIC) Simmply Active on a powerful national awareness campaign challenging one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding knife crime, that teenagers are only exposed to knife carrying in their teenage years.
Bauer Media Outdoor is supporting Simmply Active with a new public awareness campaign encouraging earlier conversations about children’s exposure to knives and urging parents and carers to recognise potential warning signs before concerns escalate.
Created in partnership with TBWA\MCR and children's Community Interest Company (CIC) Simmply Active, the national campaign challenges one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding knife crime: that children are only exposed to knife carrying during their teenage years.
The campaign warns that children and young people can be exposed to knives far younger than many parents realise, highlighting the need for earlier conversations, awareness and intervention.
Running under the stark headline “KIDS CAN LEARN TO PICK UP KNIVES YOUNGER THAN YOU THINK”, the campaign features three striking out-of-home executions, photographed by Lol Keegan. Each image shows a familiar childhood toy: a teddy bear, a doll and a rubber duck scarred with injuries that reflect knife wounds.
The unsettling creative is designed to confront an uncomfortable reality. While knife crime is most visible among teenagers, professionals working with children are increasingly seeing knife carrying emerge at younger ages. Among under-10s, this is often a safeguarding concern rather than an issue of criminality, with children influenced by online content, gaming, social media and older peers.
The campaign goes beyond raising awareness, positioning Simmply Active as part of the solution by offering children and young people positive alternatives and trusted support.
Founded by former teacher David Simmons, Simmply Active gives children positive alternatives through sport, mentoring and trusted adult relationships. The organisation helps young people build confidence, resilience and a sense of belonging before they are drawn towards harmful influences.
Simmply Active was established following a life-changing experience for Simmons in 2017. While working in a primary school, he encountered a six-year-old child in the playground carrying a knife, waving it around and threatening to stab him. The incident exposed a reality many people struggle to believe: that children can become exposed to knives at an age far younger than public perception suggests.
At its core, the campaign presents Simmply Active as part of the solution — offering children a safer, more constructive alternative and a chance to choose a different path.
The campaign will run throughout August across donated digital out of home sites from Bauer Media Outdoor, including the UK’s largest digital Out of Home network, Adshel Live. It will also be further supported by a mobile digital advertising van operating across London through Mobile Media.
The campaign aims to spark conversations in everyday locations, including homes, schools and local communities, encouraging parents and carers to recognise that the earliest warning signs may not look the way they expect.
By reframing knife carrying as an issue of prevention rather than punishment, Bauer Media Outdoor, TBWA\MCR and Simmply Active hope to encourage earlier support and ultimately help stop children from picking up knives in the first place.
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