Lidl Manchester Piccadilly

Our project operates from St Andrews Methodist And United Reformed Church a welcoming space where individuals and families can access support with dignity. We identify service users through referrals from local agencies, walk-ins, word-of-mouth, and direct outreach. We listen carefully to understand each person’s circumstances, ensuring our support is tailored to their needs. We offer a weekly hot food kitchen for those experiencing homelessness, financial hardship, or isolation. We also provide free food parcels, clothing, and household essentials such as bedding, kitchenware, and toiletries. Seasonal support is available too, including warm coats in winter and school supplies in autumn. All services are completely free of charge, because we believe that access to food, warmth, and dignity should never come with a price tag. Surplus food donations are distributed through our hot meals and parcel service. We prioritise those most in need, including individuals without housing, families facing financial strain, and elderly residents at risk of isolation. Food is shared both on-site and through flexible responses to urgent needs, such as doorstep deliveries. The impact of these donations is profound: they reduce hunger and food waste, restore dignity and choice, foster connection and wellbeing, ease financial pressure, and support sustainability by redirecting edible surplus away from landfill. Every service we offer is rooted in compassion, community, and the belief that everyone deserves care, connection, and hope. All surplus food donations are distributed completely free of charge to those in need. Our aim is to ensure that no one in our community goes hungry, and that dignity is never compromised by cost. Each week, we receive surplus food from local suppliers, supermarkets, and community partners. Our team carefully inspects and sorts the donations, then assembles food bags tailored to different needs. Family parcels include fresh produce, pantry staples, and child-friendly items. Smaller bags are prepared for single parents and individuals. For those without access to cooking facilities, we create ready-to-eat packs with nourishing, easy-to-carry items. These food bags are given out in several ways. Families and individuals can collect them directly from our premises. For those unable to travel—such as elderly residents or single parents—we offer doorstep delivery when possible. Our outreach teams also carry food bags during their rounds, offering immediate support to people sleeping rough or living in temporary accommodation.

We are a charity called the Wai Yin Society set up by women within the Chinese community initially for Chinese women but which over the years has diversified to include other ethnic minority groups of all genders. Our centre is the Welcome Centre based in Cheetham Hill, Manchester where we serve a highly diverse population in an area of high deprivation. We aim to meet the immediate and practical needs of large numbers of service users as well as provide an easily accessible advice service. We have a community café, an urban farm with chickens and ducks, we run sessions for furniture upcycling and computing skills. We provide welfare and education services including art/calligraphy classes and ESOL classes; a laundry service for the homeless and those in need; basic toiletries; emergency food parcels and a clothes bank. We run gardening sessions at the Welcome Centre as well as at allotments behind the Irish Heritage Centre. We run a work club to help people get back into the job market and IT drop in sessions for those who do not have access to a computer or the internet and cycle repair facilities once a week. The Self Help organisation uses our Centre 3 days a week as a base for seeing clients in the North Manchester area. We host NHS health checks and cancer support groups and run accredited training courses to improve employment prospects. We run advice sessions to help people in crisis, supporting them in applying for various benefits, dealing with debts and a host of everyday problems. In the year between 1st June 2018 and 31st May 2019 we had a footfall of almost 19,000. We provided 6228 hot lunches and 880 emergency food parcels. Lunches cost 50p if service users can afford to pay, otherwise they are provided free. We receive a basic grant from Manchester City Council to provide the emergency food parcels, but this does not cover the cost for the number of people who are being referred to us by Job Centres, Advice Centres, Social Services, Community nurses etc. We go to Fruitful Office once a week to collect fruit and to Costco in Chadderton once a week to collect the donations. These donations are distributed to those in need as well as being used to provide lunches in the Community Cafe. We serve not only the local communities of Cheetham Hill and Crumpsall but people come to us from Blackley, Harpurhey, Moston and as far afield as Ashton and Bolton.

Our Room is an arts, wellbeing and social support charity that works creatively to empower men and LGBT men and Trans people who sex work / are homeless or both. We offer them opportunities to get involved in high quality arts projects whilst accessing one to one support for challenges they face in their everyday lives. We offer weekly creative sessions (complete with a hot drink and a toastie), weekly wellbeing sessions, 1-2-1 support (for housing and other support), toiletries and household essentials, free condoms and lube and we are always grateful for food donations, which we offer to the people we work with whenever they visit us in person.