Refrigerated Van for Northwich Produce

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Funded on
24 May 2022

The number of visitors to our no food waste initiative has tripled since November. At times we have refused fresh produce because we lacked an appropriate van for transportation and refrigeration

£34,541 Raised of £34,247

25 Backers

100%

Our Delivery Report

Funded on 24 May 2022 | Delivered on 21 September 2022

£34,541

RAISED

25

BACKERS

50

DAYS TO FUND

BIGGEST PLEDGE

Largest pledge from Hub collection Jan, feb March

£10,923

From Hub collection Jan, feb March

£5

MOST POPULAR PLEDGE AMOUNT

£10,000

DONATED

By National Lottery

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Groundwork donated £1,125

tonnes of food from going to waste prevented

17 tonnes of food from going to waste prevented

Councillor Weltman donated £500

Northwich Community Support donated £5

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Asda donated £200

£10,000

DONATED

By Cheshire West and Chester Council

CWAC Ward Councillers

CWAC Ward Councillers donated £1,350

Redrow donated £250

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More about our impact

The environment

We have rationalised our processing sites so we no longer use peoples private properties for storage. This reduces the number of traffic movements, the van enabling us to transport larger volumes in fewer journeys. As the van is refrigerated, we can collect meat and ready meals from supermarket distribution centres in pallet load quantities and keep them viable for longer, reducing wastage to landfill. A single van journey replaces multiple private car journeys.

The local economy

By processing food that would have gone to waste local suppliers have been saved the cost of disposal. Any food waste that cannot be distributed is donated to local pig and chicken farms.

Volunteering, jobs & education

NCS has a regular program of recruiting and training Duke of Edinburghs volunteers. All successful young people receive a graduation certificate. We constantly recruite and induct new volunteers from the local community. We have a relationship with the Russett Special Education School in Weaverham to train some of their young people.

http://www.northwichcommunity.com

Northwich Community Support (NCS) is a registered charitable organisation aimed at preventing or relieving poverty through the distribution of donated surplus food and the provision of linked support, services and advice to individuals and families in financial need. We distribute food to 500 families in financial need each week. We also reduce Northwich's carbon footprint by reducing food waste whic would otherwise go to landefill.

We are staffed entirely by volunteers preventing good food going to landfill and helping people stretch their weekly budget. We are not a foodbank, no one is turned away or has too prove they are on benefits. You don't have have be on benefits to be finacially struggling. We aim to destigmatise poverty. We will never ship food out of Northwich when our community would benefit from it.

Our week of hubs starts with Winnington in the Scout hut on Winnington Ave, CW8 4EE, Sunday morning, Tuesday morning at Cuddington at St John’s Parish Centre on Norley Rd, CW8 2JU, Next up is Weaverham on Wednesday morning at the Lighthouse on Church Lane, CW8 3NJ.Then last but not least the Rudheath hub on Friday morning at the Rudheath social club on Middlewich Rd, CW9 7DN.

Additional flash hubs are organised on an ad-hoc basis to handle oversupply offers from local supermarkets, retailers and food distribution centres.

We actively promote our activities though social media to ensure people know where and when we are operating and to manage expectations of what we have available. This seems to self regulate the number of people attending so that we have satisfied patrons and minimal waste. Spoiled produce and the little left over goes to animal feed collected locally.

We are an organisation focussed on helping people while reducing food waste. We need a refrigerated van to increase the volume and variety of perishable food available, reduce our number of transport movements and the shelf life of the donated products.

A van will help us be consistent across our hubs and spread the food fairly across them. We are currently being lobbied to operate a fifth local hub.

Our model could be replicated across CWAC.

Project Owner: Northwich Community Support The Project Owner takes legal responsibility for receiving and spending the funds raised and ensuring the project is delivered.