Sainsbury's Market Harborough

We started in October 2015 feeding the homeless, rootless and in need on a Saturday. We now run a Social Supermarket on Tuesdays 12 - 2, a fresh fruit and vegetable food bank on Thursdays 12 - 2 all from surplus food from Supermarkets and Saturdays we serve hot food 5 - 6pm. We currently run 5 projects. Our first project is Dine With Us on The Streets - Cherries Legacy where we support between 80 to 100 people with hot hearty food, take away food such as tins, sandwiches, crisps, fruit, hot drinks, toiletries and clothes, every Saturday These are people who are either street homeless, in hostels, on means tested benefits or in other financial crisis. We have been running this project since October 2015 and we believe in treating people with respect and with dignity. Our second project is Dine With Us Community Larder, our Food Bank project ,launched in February 2019, giving access to vital nourishment for those suffering food poverty. The need for this is much greater than we anticipated and we now need more partners so we can ensure that we have enough food to meet the demand. We are also incurring significant costs operating the programme, with the yearly rent on the unit, running costs and other sundries. We have seen as many as 75 (seventy five) families come to collect food in a single day. Our third project sees us support 11 schools with more looking to come on board (which we cannot commit to yet as we do not have enough food). Fresh fruit and vegetables and protein play a pivotal part in our organisation, as is encouraging people to eat more healthily, regardless of their circumstances. Our fourth project is sending out care packages to the community, quite often through the schools as well and our fifth project is opening and running Bedfords first Social Supermarket which has been in operation since April 2020. This gives people access to affordable food and provides a fundraising vehicle for us, to help towards the other projects we run on a goodwill basis.

We run a Community Fridge open Tuesday - Saturday 9-4pm and until 8pm on Thursdays. Free access to free food that would otherwise be going into landfill. We accept donations from Supermarkets, food businesses and households. We rely on Volunteers collecting the food and always welcome more volunteers to join our team. The community fridge is open to everyone, no-one needs to sign up, walk in and help yourself to the food you need, it's all free.

Hope has been helping address poverty in Northampton since 1974, with an initial focus on homelessness but now widened to many more people in need. Six days a week we feed and help up to 40 homeless people, supplying a hot meal each day with food parcels to go. We also help people on low incomes through our separate the Hope food club, an innovative social supermarket taking food to pop-up shops on out of town estates. We are now currently helping over 180 families with our food club pop up shop in four locations in Northampton and are looking to expand out of the town to reach more in our county, with the help of the local community and local business we aim to ensure if help is needed we are there. We are part of a growing network for other local charities to work together to serve Northamptonshire's people, please get in contact if you feel you are able to help in any way.