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HP channel-driven education trade-in scheme rolls into second year
Vendor looks to get more resellers involved as it embarks on a more ambitious scheme
The positive experiences from the first year of the channel-driven Brighter Futures education trade-in programme has meant the effort will roll on with plans to reach more schools and colleges.
Brighter Futures first appeared last year, but HP and its partner, Consenna, have been running a trade-in programme for education for more than a decade.
Last year’s incarnation heavily involved the channel, with 40 of HP’s partners getting behind the initiative. The plan this time around is to extend the trade-in programme so that schools can encourage their local communities to also get involved with trading in old tech to boost the value they have to spend on fresh equipment.
James Fitch, client director at Consenna, said it had been able to make an impact in the first year of the scheme and was looking to build on that experience.
“The success of Brighter Futures in its first year demonstrates just how needed a programme of this kind is,” he said.
“We helped schools replace in excess of 23,000 devices, and in doing so, ploughed almost £2.5m back into their budgets for new equipment,” said Fitch.
“This year, with a wider pool of reseller partners, and with additional elements such as community involvement, we’re confident of delivering even greater impact and further changing the narrative when it comes to IT investment in education.”
Sustainability positives
One of the benefits for those channel partners that sign up is that it has encouraged wider conversations with schools that have led to more activity beyond simply the trade-in programme. It also has clear sustainability positives, with devices that might have been destined for landfill being saved from the dump.
Finch said that aspect of Brighter Futures was a crucial element of the scheme. “The importance of driving forward sustainability in the IT sector is something that Consenna has championed for a long while, and with levels of IT investment in UK education growing, it was vital for us to ensure this was the most sustainable programme of its kind that the sector had seen,” he said.
Mike Pope, UK and Ireland senior commercial category team lead at HP, said the vendor was committed to helping improve education opportunities for students through technology.
“We’re proud to have helped schools replace well over 20,000 devices in the past year, and look forward to working with Consenna as we enter the programme’s second year with a commitment to further build the programme to have even more impact,” he said.
