February 2025

In this month's issue, we look forward to Lent, present our Annual Report, look for a new Trustee Treasurer, hear the experiences of one of our fantastic foodbank volunteers and much more...

Looking forward to Lent

Dear Dominique,

Next Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, marking the start of Lent - the 40 day period leading up to Easter. It is traditionally a time when people gave up certain luxuries to focus on being closer to God.

Sadly, for too many in our communities, going without is far from a voluntary choice to be experienced for a limited time. Rather it is a necessity, often brought by circumstances beyond their immediate control.

This Lent, we ask you to consider how you may be able to support people facing hardship in our communities; through donations of food to our foodbanks, financial giving to support our work or praying for those in need across Nottingham.

However you show your support, we really appreciate your continued generosity and kindness.

Thank you.

“There are three elements that are almost always part of Lent: prayer, giving something up and giving something back.”

Elizabeth Hyndman

Looking back at a year of Hope

We are SO proud to present our published Annual Report for our last financial year (July 2023 - June 2024) which you can view here (always a bit delayed to get the accounts audited and because we have tonnes of news to share! Thanks to our volunteer army, it gets bigger every year!

We are hugely grateful for the thousands of supporters and donors, the hundreds of volunteers who have given so much time, effort, food and money which have enabled Hope Nottingham to bring Hope to so many people in communities across Nottingham. We also really enjoy the relationships we have with so many partner organisations and churches.

So please do grab a cuppa, have a read, and be inspired by what you have been a part of! And we look forward to continuing to work with you to Inspire and Grow Communities of Hope in 2025 and beyond...

Supporting our foodbanks this Lent

Can you help support our foodbanks across Nottingham this Lent?

We are taking part in Trussell's Lent "40 for 40" Challenge - and would love your help. You can download our "40 things for 40 days" food donation calendar here but to be really honest, we also really need financial gifts! If we only spend the bare minimum it costs us around £30,000 per calendar month just to help us pay the rent, keep the lights and heating on, keep our van moving, provide meals and refreshments for our guests and cover the cost of our small staff team. This figure excludes foodbank stocks.

We know people worry about charities spending on salaries, but we are no different to any charity, in that our staff team provide the back infrastructure and support to our 370 volunteers, across 14 locations with a multitude of activities to look after, alongside the less exciting administrative and legal stuff we have to ensure!

There is more about our staff team and how we run the organisation in our Annual Report - do take a look, if you haven't already!

View from a volunteer

Our volunteer team is made up of over 370 individuals who give their time to help others in their local communities. Coming from all backgrounds and walks of life, we simply couldn't make an impact without them.

This month we hear from Caroline, one of the volunteer team at Meadows Foodbank based at Bridgeway Hall Methodist Mission - currently our busiest foodbank.

How long have you been volunteering?

I must have worked at the Meadows foodbank for about ten years by now.

What role do you volunteer in?

I do a Tuesday evening and Saturday morning foodbank session and collect the weekly donations from Sainsburys Castle Marina store.

What do you enjoy about volunteering?

I absolutely love the work I do at the foodbank and work with some fantastic, dedicated volunteers. The Tuesday team turn up in all weather throughout the dark winter months and the Saturday team give up their valuable morning having worked all week . Being friends with these volunteers is a huge part of the enjoyment.

Over the years the foodbank has changed immensely, from working in very cramped conditions, causing a lot of laughs and meaning a lot of agility was needed - the Covid months were quite a challenge! Now it's a great big space which is incredibly well organised and user friendly (although it can be freezing in the winter and boiling in the summer!) The shelves go from heart-warmingly full to worryingly empty but we seem to fill bags somehow.

But most of all it’s the guests who make my volunteering so worthwhile.

It can be so rewarding and emotional to see how very grateful and relieved guests look when carrying big bags of food away with them. There are of course many who are just too stressed and unhappy to show thanks … but hopefully their bags get them through another few difficult days ahead.

Our sincere thanks go to Caroline for sharing her experience and to the rest of the Meadows team and to all our volunteers across all our activities, for the time, dedication and compassion they give.

Treasurer needed

Skilled Trustees are vital to the good governance of our organisation.

We are currently looking for a dedicated individual to join our Board of Trustees as our Trustee Treasurer. If you have suitable qualifications and/or financial experience, we'd love to hear from you.

We are also looking to recruit a Fundraising Support Trustee/volunteers to join our team to support us as we look to build further corporate support and improve our fundraising.

You can view the advert for both these opportunities here.

Benefact Movement for Good draw

Thanks to our amazing supporters nominating us for the Benefact Group's Movement for Good, we received £1000 in their last draw! We'd love your help to repeat this in their next draw. Please do nominate us as your chosen charity using the link below. It only takes 2 minutes and can make a huge difference!

A journey towards Easter joy!

As we begin the season of Lent, why not join us for our Closer series? The sessions explore ways of connecting with God through prayer, reflection and worship. Everyone is welcome to attend any or all sessions.

Sharing the love at community meals

We were definitely feeling the love at our Valentine's themed community meals at our Beeston and Carlton hubs this month! Our community meals provide a valuable opportunity for local people to gather, share time and stories together and get to know new people as well as enjoy a delicious meal cooked by our incredible volunteer teams.

We are also looking for befriender volunteers at our Beeston Friendship Group on a Tuesday afternoon and at our monthly Beeston Community Meal, as well as office volunteers Mon-Thurs at Beeston, morning or afternoon. Check out our volunteering page for all our current vacancies.

Broxtowe Food Support Network supporting local projects

We were honoured that Broxtowe Borough Council asked Hope Nottingham to bring together all the food support projects in the borough, so we can learn from each other and discuss how we can reduce food insecurity in our communities.

We established the Network in October, surveying the 18 members so we could seek to address the common challenges. Our three meetings have seen 12 projects represented and we have covered topics such as sourcing food, referral systems, targeting services at those in greatest need, Food Waste Action Week and joint training for our staff. It’s been very useful to have a closer link with Broxtowe Borough Council to draw on their resources too. The funding for this project is due to finish in March, but we hope to continue to meet long-term, as members have found it really useful to connect.

Members of the network include:

Broxtowe Youth Homeless, Stapleford Community Group, Chayah Project, Brinsley Food Bank, Eastwood People’s Initiative, Eastwood Volunteer Bureau’s Food Bank, Eastwood Food Club, Chilwell Food Club, St Barnabas Church, Broxtowe Community Projects, Harvest Community Haven, Phoenix Community Project, Wholly Ground Café, Toton Methodist Church, Hope Nottingham and our satellites at the Church at Montrose Court, Haven Church and St Barnabas Church.

Gedling Voluntary Action Collective

Hope Nottingham are pleased to be part of the new Gedling Voluntary Action Collective. Gedling CVS closed a good few years ago and we've joined the mission to set up a new 'clicks and mortar' version - online support for voluntary and community groups via a new website and events in local community hubs like ours. There are a series of launch events planned - see the details below. Please do book yourself a place if you are interested and spread the word to other local community groups.

Improving our buildings

We are very grateful for our hub buildings in Beeston and Carlton - and the role they play in serving our local communities. However, as both are old, former church buildings, they do cost a lot to keep warm and maintained.

We are therefore delighted to have received an Energy Efficiency Grant to insulate the lower hall at Hope House and re-insulate and re-felt some of the external flat roofs. We also had a grant from the Benefact Trust to replace three of the aging windows at Carlton Community Hub - lots more to fundraise for! We look forward to the work being fully completed and our buildings benefiting local people for many years to come.

Final thoughts...

This month, we invite you to join us as we pray for all that goes on at each of our foodbanks and community hubs, all our guests and all our volunteers throughout Lent. You can read more about our Lent prayer challenge, including some prayer suggestions, here.

Hope Nottingham | 0303 040 1110 | www.hope-nottingham.org.uk