Surrey Live article
https://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/surrey-news/last-year-guildford-food-banks-31326630
Thank you to Joseph Bickle for spending time at the food bank last week to understand more about our work.

Donor message February 2025

Dear Donor,
The work we do to help our community in Guildford and surrounding villages involves a huge number of people giving what they can to help. You are a part of this caring group. Below is a snap shot of those involved in 2024.

Your donations have enabled us to cope with demand that was up 27% on 2023, for which we are incredibly grateful, we really could not do this work without your support.

Christmas appeal

In early November, I wrote to ask if our donors could give a little more to help us through December, by funding supermarket vouchers and helping us maintain stock levels and into January with our Energy Manage project (see below). Your response was amazing! Thank you so much. We are also incredibly grateful to those who prayed for us during this time.

We also published the above donor appeal letter on our website. This was picked up by the BBC in early December, helping us spread the word about local need even more widely, which also resulted in additional donations. It is clear that when people are aware there is a need, there is a lot of kindness in our community.

In December we were able to provide for clients in a record breaking month of 368 food parcels. Financial and food donations came when we needed them.

Due to your support and our careful planning, we were able to serve all our clients and maintain healthy stock levels.

Client reactions

Our clients are so grateful for the support they receive and the addition of a supermarket voucher with their December parcel often resulted in tearful reactions. Below is just one message of thanks we received in late December from a lady who had had to flee her home for her own safety.

“I just wanted to thank you for the amazing food parcel and vouchers. I am literally blown away at how much was there and so grateful for you bringing this to me today and saving my Christmas”

Fundraising in 2024

We spent a considerable amount of time on fundraising activity during 2024, due to the increased need we are seeing. We made a couple of successful grant applications to the Surrey Community Fund, hosted a fundraising concert (thank you Liz Simcock) and we ran “shopping list request” events at Waitrose and Sainsburys, which were very successful. Thank you to all those who gave their time to help with these events.

We have been supported by RSM as their charity partner this year along with numerous local businesses collect donations and raise funds for us. We were also blessed to have the support of The County Club, who chose us as their charity for 2024. Their very generous donation of the funds has just been transferred to us and will really help with our work in 2025.

Local schools and youth group

I have had a lot of fun hosting Cubs, Scouts, Explorer Scouts and school groups at the food bank and also visited Beaver and Brownie meetings and a year 2 group at school. During these sessions the young people have the opportunity to carry out some of the tasks our volunteers do, to gain an understanding of who may need to use the food bank and ask as many questions as they can. These groups have also been extremely generous in making donations to us.

It is wonderful to have so many individuals, clubs, churches, schools and companies learning about and contributing to the work we do. I have added a couple of additional highlights below.

Panto ticket donation

Local custom car club, Surrey Street Rodders donated 80 pantomime tickets for our client families. Many who received these tickets were overwhelmed by the unexpected gift and the prospect of being able to take their children out for fun family time together.

Following a financial collection, the local branch of AMYA bought and delivered a huge amount of food for the food bank at the beginning of January. This really helped us be confident we have the stock to cater for all those needing support this month.

Into 2025

We would like to encourage ongoing regular donations from as many of our donors as possible. If we know our expected income, we can have more confidence that we will not have to undertake any significant fundraising activity early on this year. Our efforts can therefore be focused on our clients and ensuring we are offering the best possible support we can.

January 2025 has started busy, with food parcel numbers up 13% on last year January. This has been our busiest January in the 12 year history of our food bank.

Pilot fuel project
Supporting our clients who are billed for their energy

Thanks to your donations, we have been able to launch our three month pilot project with Energy Manage. In addition to the current support we provide by way of fuel vouchers, via our partner The Fuel Bank Foundation, to clients who are on pre-payment meters; we now able to provide advice and some financial support to those who are billed for their energy. Our volunteer team talk to those who receive a food parcel and ask if the client has an interest in reducing their fuel bills. If they are keen to do this, we make a referral to David at Energy Manage. David is also attending our client sessions on a Friday to meet people face to face. It is early days, but uptake has been steady. We will review the first 6 weeks of this project at our Trustee meeting in late February, review the benefit to our clients and consider whether we can continue with this support in the longer term.

Our prayer is that this additional support has the potential to move people out of financial crisis to be able to manage without the support of the food bank in the future.

News from St Clare’s
St Clare’s Church has continued to be extremely supportive of the work we are doing. We are excited to be part of a new chapter with the church with the arrival of James Herring as the new pastor, along with his wife Michele and their three children. They are passionate about the community in Park Barn where North Guildford Food Bank is based and are working to reach as many of the community as they can.

EasyFundraising
You can also raise money for us without it costing you anything!
We currently have 21 supporters signed up to EasyFundraising and through their online shopping, have raised £326 so far. This money is donated by the retailers, so anyone who spends online can join and contribute to our work, with no additional cost to them. Just imagine how much we could raise if we had 200 supporters!
Follow this link to join sign up and please share with friends, family and colleagues https://join.easyfundraising.org.uk/north-guildford-food-bank/gll5di/at/EDA0jpqh/DM1329426/facebook/

Please know that every donation we receive is incredibly valuable to us and we rejoice with every one received. A man popped in to see us in early December and told me that he liked to donate his bus fare if he missed the bus and walked instead. Wow!

Do contact me if you have any questions about the work we are doing.

Wishing you a healthy, happy and blessed 2025.

Best wishes

Jessica

Manager

07538 413525

[email protected]
My normal working days are Monday – Thursday
North Guildford Food Bank
Registered charity number: 1188640

Donors Christmas Update 2024 Download

Thanks to all of our wonderful Donors in 2023!

Dear Donors

After another busy year at North Guildford Food Bank we want to thank you so much for the support you have provided us in the past year. We have so many donors who give either produce or financial support and without you all, we would not have been able to serve the number of people we did in 2023.

Our statistics summarise our work in 2023. We have provided 1,709 food parcels, feeding 2,669 adults and 2072 children. This was a small increase of 43 parcels from the previous year.

The main reasons for needing help this year were unemployment and debt. Our main referrers were Guildford Borough Council, Home School Link Workers and Citizens Advice.

Since early 2023 we have no longer needed to provide funding for fuel vouchers, but instead, we partner with The Fuel Bank Foundation which is a charitable organisation. We refer our clients on prepayment meters who are in fuel poverty to the Fuel Bank Foundation and they provide fuel vouchers. The value of these vouchers varies depending on the time of year, but the aim is to provide sufficient fuel funding to last the household a week.

Guildford Council Wellbeing team is continuing to provide a driver and van on Wednesdays to take parcels to clients who need them to be delivered and we have volunteer drivers to do deliveries on other days for clients who are housebound. Robin (GBC) is also very helpful in bringing boxes from supermarkets for us to pack parcels into.

Christmas 2023

In the two weeks before Christmas we saw demand like never before and in December served 306 clients, compared to 200 in December last year. We are blessed to have some reserves in the bank so that we were able to buy more stock, in addition to food donations, which was needed on an almost daily basis. Our monthly spend on food more than doubled in December and our healthy stock levels were reduced to nothing for many foods.

As last year, we increased our regular client sessions from three to four per week for the two weeks before Christmas. Due to the large numbers of clients, our volunteers started packing food parcels much earlier than normal and when demand was highest, we staggered client arrival times.

We also provided Tesco vouchers to our clients in December, in addition to their food parcels, giving them the opportunity to buy extra items for their families over Christmas.

We are very thankful for Guildford Lions who continue to buy eggs, potatoes and carrots for us each week. They have been so supportive, even when we had such an increase in demand.

We are in the process of building our stocks and reserves up again, so please look on our Facebook page and website for our weekly requests. We are also so thankful to those of you who donate financially to the food bank as food donations alone are not sufficient to meet the needs of the number of clients who are being referred to us.

http://northguildfordfoodbank.co.uk/food-donations/

Volunteers and St Clare’s

Our team of volunteers continues to grow and it is such a joy to work alongside so many caring, compassionate and hardworking people. We currently have close to 100 volunteers.

We would also like to thank St Clare’s church for continuing to host us. It is such a lovely space for our clients to come to to collect their food parcels and having a permanent place for food storage is a wonderful blessing.

We would also like to thank MMRG for providing us with space in their offices, so that our Administrator Annie and new manager Jessica have a warm, comfortable and collaborative space to work in.

Operations and Governance

This year Jo stepped down as our Interim Coordinator and Chair of Trustees. Jo’s passion for the work of the food bank has helped us through a tricky couple of years and we are extremely grateful for all she has done and we are delighted she is continuing as one of our team leaders and is also an invaluable member of the Monday “sort” team.

We will say a fond farewell to Les from our board of Trustees this month. He has kindly stayed with us this year to ensure that our new Treasurer, Sarah is fully up to speed. We are thankful for the 11 years of faithful service Les has given to the food bank.

Geoff is our new chair of trustees and brings with him some great connections from his work in the Diocese. Clive has also joined us as a Trustee in 2023 and brings another fresh pair of eyes to our work.

Our employee numbers doubled in October 2023, when Jessica joined North Guildford Food Bank as Manager. Her role is to ensure that the food bank can continue on a sustainable footing into the future. Her role as manager also includes many of the coordination tasks that Jo used to do.

Jessica has been working closely with the team leaders and other volunteers to understand the workings of the food bank and where they can see improvements we can make. One of our objectives is to try and reach more people in need and we are doing this by building on our relationships with our referral agencies and making North Guildford Food Bank more visible in the community.

With all of the above in mind, your giving is more important than ever, so thank you.

Please share this information with any family and friends who you think may be interested in supporting our work.

Wishing you a blessed year.

With thanks from the Food Bank team.

2023-Thank-You-Slide-1 Download

New Donation Point – Sainsbury’s Local, East Horsley

Hi Everyone, many thanks again for your continued support. We are just letting you know that we now have a new donation point at the new Sainsbury’s local in East Horsley.

Many thanks again to all of you who donate, we couldn’t do it without you!

January 2023

To all our supporters

We wanted to thank you for your generous support over the past year, and to give you an up-date on the Food Bank in 2022. As you can imagine, it was another busy year for us – but thanks to a huge team of dedicated volunteers, and to the generosity of donors, we have been able to continue to meet the needs of clients who come to us for emergency help.

I’m sure that most of you know that we remain based at St Clare’s Church in Park Barn. We are very grateful for the continued use of the Church as our expanded base. A particular mention also needs to be made to the Guildford Lions who buy in eggs, potatoes & carrots for us each week. This is a huge commitment – with client numbers and costs increasing so significantly. Last year we also benefited from a huge donation of food from Southern Co-op when they took over the store at the garage on Woodbridge Road – as well as from loyal customers who donate at Sainsbury’s and Waitrose, from churches, schools, businesses and individuals. We have needed and greatly appreciate support from you all. Thank you!

We provided food for 5181 people last year (2711 adults & 2470 children), up from 5061 in 2021. The top reason given for needing help was unemployment, followed by debt and benefits delays, cuts and sickness, and our top referring agencies were Home School Link Workers, followed by Guildford and Surrey Councils. Money spent on making fuel payments (to clients on prepayment metres) also rose to £57,494.

We have made a number of changes this year in order to continue to support the numbers of clients coming to us for help, and to ensure the charity is sustainable going forward. The most significant are as follows:

• We have consolidated our base at St Clare’s, closing our base at Merrow. This wasn’t done lightly – but a review of clients showed that demand for collection from the Bushy Hill centre over the past 6-9 months was so limited that it did not justify keeping the branch open. We are grateful for Mariah and her team for running the branch for so long. We continue to support Merrow clients from St Clares, and deliver parcels to Merrow if necessary.

• We appointed our first paid part-time employee to help us with administration. Thanks to the Lighthouse for supporting us in this. We are delighted to have Annie now in position, and proving to be a great help!

• We are encouraging clients to come and collect their food parcels from us. We provide free tea, coffee, cake and a listening ear when they pick up (and often welcome in others who like to drop in for a chat). The café is much appreciated by clients, and we are able to signpost other sources of support at these sessions if needed – though of course no one is obliged to stay

• Guildford Council Wellbeing team is continuing to provide a driver and van on Wednesdays to take parcels to clients who need them to be delivered, and we have drivers to do deliveries on other days if collection isn’t possible

• We have recently changed providers for the fuel top-ups to the Fuel Bank Foundation. The provision of top-ups to clients with prepayment metres is quite a complex, time-consuming job – and the cost of administering it under the original set up was increasing. The switch should reduce costs and simplify the process for our dedicated fuel team – who do a fantastic job

• Jo has continued to be our Interim Coordinator. However, our Treasurer, Les (who has been involved since we were founded), is standing down in 2023. One of our current Team leaders (Sarah) is stepping up into the role in the next few weeks. We are very grateful to Les for his many years of expertise and support – and to Sarah for taking the role on.

Rest assured that we will continue to reassess what we do & how we do it going forward of course – recognising the objects of the charity in providing relief of financial hardship in our town and surrounding villages.

However, it is clear that the need for the Food Bank continues – and indeed we think it is likely to increase in the year ahead – so we are hugely thankful for the support we have received. We could not continue to operate without you… so thank you once again.

May we wish you well in 2023.

With thanks from the Foodbank team

January 2021

To all our supporters

We are hugely grateful to everyone who has supported us over the last year. The last 9 months in particular have been an extremely busy time for us, and we have had to be agile about amending our processes to carry on providing food throughout.

Thanks to a huge team of very dedicated volunteers and to many generous donors, we have been able to continue seamlessly through the Covid crisis, and in fact have been able to be more generous in our parcels so that they last for closer to a week and now include some fresh items such as bread, cheese, milk and butter (carrots, potatoes and eggs were already part of our pack).

Demand for parcels was huge at the beginning of lockdown when we were giving out more than 3 times our pre-Covid average. Since then, things have calmed down with other projects around the town which were put in place, so that in general we’ve been about 2 times busier than usual. There is a chart below which shows the monthly figures compared to last year.

Over Christmas we organised and put together a special additional bag for each household filled with Christmas treats donated by local schools, businesses, community groups, churches & individuals. We were also able to include a supermarket voucher for everyone in these bags which clients have been hugely grateful for. Below, you will also find some excerpts of thank you emails and texts which we received from clients over the Christmas period.

It is the generosity of local people, together with some funding that we’ve been awarded, that allow us to confidently continue to provide for people who are struggling at the moment, and we are hugely grateful for the level of support we’ve received.

May we wish you well in 2021.

Heather & all the Foodbank team

Thank yous over Christmas 2020:

‘Thank you to all that was involved in the delivery of food items and the voucher, that I shall use to buy meat for my Christmas dinner. I appreciate your kind help.’

‘Thank you so much for the food and bits and the voucher you have no idea how grateful me and my girls are.’

‘I just received a food parcel from you. I would like to say a massive thank you it was really really well needed and after the year that we’ve all had, I can actually have a sensible Christmas so I want to say thank you to you and the team at St. Clare’s for all the hard work that you’re all doing the local community I wish you all a very happy Christmas lots of loves and prayers.”

“ I just opened the Christmas card that you sent me. I forgot about it last night and put it up on the shelf and I’ve just opened it to find I have a £30 Tesco voucher. Thank you so so much from the bottom of my heart. “

‘I am emailing you to say a massive thank you for the package that you sent me at Christmas, it helped me a lot and made me feel like someone cared for me over the Christmas period. I massively appreciate it.’