Massive team effort by volunteers and supporters – 10,000+ items donated.
With huge thanks to our volunteers, donors and supporters, we provided food for just over 4,000 meals for 445 people in December – our second busiest month of the year (after August in the school summer holidays).
December’s deliveries took our total to 41,778 meals in 2024 – our third busiest year on record.
At four of the month’s seven sessions we supplied food for more than 70 people across the southern half of the borough.
At the busiest of these, on Wednesday 18th December, clients who were due deliveries on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day instead received increased food and also an Aldi gift card for £25-£70 depending on the size of the family.
“It was one massive team effort by our volunteers and supporters to ensure that our clients and their families would not go hungry at Christmas and could enjoy some festive goodies too,” said Management Committee Chair Louise Willmer.
Louise highlighted the hard work of:
▶ The sorters who checked and date-labelled every donated tin, packet, box and jar, and shelf-fillers who replenished our shelves ready for the next session.
▶ Packers and dispatchers who prepared the clients’ food bags ready for collection by the delivery drivers.
▶ The drivers who cheerfully defied the busy Christmas traffic to deliver the bags direct to the clients’ homes…and also delivered Aldi vouchers to a record 234 clients/families as part of our Come Dine with Jesus project.
▶ And OUR DONORS AND SUPPORTERS who brought in 84 separate donations, ranging from a single bag to a complete car-load – and these were just the ones from people who signed our donations sheets. In total we received more than 10,000 items.
The amazing response to our December appeal for traditional Christmas food items and festive goodies for the Food Hub’s clients and their families meant that we were able to pass on some of these to the two Food Stops at Old Lodge Lane Baptist Church, Purley, and St Francis Church, Monks Hill, Selsdon.
Dave Lewis from Purley Food Stop said: “Thank you and your team for the great volume of food, etc, that you passed on to us today. For the first time I couldn’t get it all in my car and your volunteers rallied round to get the remainder to us. What a team!”
Among the several hundred people who our volunteers and generous supporters have helped is Mr J. He contacted us in despair when he didn’t receive a delivery one Wednesday – he had contacted his ticket partner but they hadn’t arranged it.
One of our Client Support Volunteers phoned him and found he and his partner were in crisis. They had run up debts while not working because of health problems, and were being chased by debt collectors and bailiffs. They were spending all their benefits money on paying back debts and could not afford to buy food – their cupboards were bare.
The Client Support Volunteer arranged an emergency food parcel and also contacted Citizens Advice Croydon. They are providing immediate help with debt management and giving the couple much-needed support and advice. Mr J messaged back:
“Hi, thank you to all staff at Purley Food Hub. You’re a godsend. You were so quick. You all deserve a lovely Christmas. Thank you SO much.”