Our funding has supported the Sheffield-based organisation to upcycle food for the local community.
Food Works are a Sheffield-based organisation centred on the philosophy of taking greater care of our planet and people. Their unique model provides locally sourced nutritious food to the community by upcycling food and reducing waste, and we’re proud to be working with them in our community at Richmond Park; the organisation being one of 31 recipients of our Greater Together Foundation Resilience Fund.
Structured by market, farm, kitchen and community, Food Works grows food in converted unused plots of land with the help of volunteers, and also recover unused food from businesses and producers. All of this is then put towards their schemes in the community; these are kitchens run by chefs and volunteers who cook and bake hot meals, cakes, pastries and barista coffees with a zero-waste policy, and on a pay-what-you-can basis.
A significant part of this food offer is ‘Just Meals’; freshly cooked frozen ready meals made from the locally sourced food from their kitchen and markets. These meal boxes are available from their main market at Food Works Handsworth seven days a week, with over a hundred being served daily.
This market is close to one of our key neighbourhoods, Richmond Park. In fact, we’re no stranger to Just Meals at Great Places, having supported Food Works with their offer over the pandemic, through supporting their farm plot in Manor. And so, when we advertised our Greater Together Resilience Fund, aimed at supporting organisations and initiatives that helped alleviate poverty in the community during the cost of living crisis, Food Works promptly sent in an application that very week.
The application was successful and Food Works has received £8,000 worth of funding as well as our partnership to enhance their work in one of our key neighbourhoods. This has gone directly towards the purchase of a blast chiller for one of their cafes, which has proved to be a huge help for reducing production time, therefore increasing their cooking capacity. This has allowed them to prepare 25% more meals (around 800 per month), thus expanding their reach in the community.
Helping as many people to access nutritious food as possible is at the heart of what Food Works do and what the Greater Together Resilience Fund was set up for in response to the cost of living crisis. We value our people and their wellbeing, and share Food Works’ principle that everyone should be able to enjoy food and be happy and healthy, and maximising the potential for this by reducing the amount of food that gets thrown away is a good place to start.
Whilst their support is available to everyone, a significant proportion is focused on taking pressure off struggling families, during school holidays in particular. Since Food Works began to receive our funding in February 2023, 636 free children’s meals were distributed, and 70 of these were given to children in Handsworth during the May-June half term. When asked about the difference our funding has made to their capacity, Natalie Flanagan, CFO of Food Works said:
It has been fantastic having the support from Great Places to be able to increase our meals production and provide a free school holiday meal provision to local Handsworth residents. We hope to continue working with Great Places to provide affordable and sustainable food in the city.
As we move into the Summer Holidays, this goal could not be more important. Steven Gayle, our Community Partnerships Manager in the Sheffield and South Yorkshire area said:
Great Places is very pleased to be working in partnership with Foodworks and contributing to free school holiday meal provision to local Handsworth residents. We are working with Foodworks to grow our partnership, and develop further projects to help alleviate the impact of the Cost of Living crisis for residents in our key anchor neighbourhoods.
