2 May 2024
“SHARE happened by accident really,” Claire Revie from the charity explains. “We provided a covid community response, but it wasn’t our aim to grow so much; we thought we’d be there a month, but we saw the need in the community and, because we have the supply, we’re not going to walk away.”
Claire and the team set up SHARE Wokingham in March 2020 to support people at the beginning of the pandemic. Since then, SHARE has established itself as a food sharing charity supporting people in the community via a network of 15 sites across Wokingham and Bracknell.
“The reason we expanded to other areas was because we had people walking from other neighbouring towns,” continues Claire. “This does not happen so much now.”
At SHARE, the ethos is to offer people dignity and choice by laying out the available food in the style of a market stall, which they can then browse and take what they want and need.
“We don’t work on a referral basis,” says Claire. “We were really aware that, at the start of covid, there were people accessing support that had never done so before and felt quite embarrassed to do so. So, this way, if they’re helping with food waste it doesn’t feel like they’re coming to a food bank. Everybody that comes to us will leave with more than they came with.
“The food we get from FareShare we tend to hand out to people directly. If we get lots of fruit and veg, I will often make a big pot of soup which is served while people are waiting to go get their food. We recently had some pizza bases, so I made up some pizzas. People are offered free tea, coffee and biscuits before we open.”
Every week, the team at SHARE Wokingham collect food from various Waitrose stores, including Waitrose Wokingham, Waitrose Bracknell, Waitrose Sunningdale and Waitrose Woodley, via FareShare Go.
“From Waitrose, we get a bit of everything – we even got Guinea fowl last week,” continues Claire. “We get everything from meat, fruit and veg, bakery - everything you would purchase in a standard shop.
“Waitrose has been very good at educating staff on what food can be saved and the food is always nicely boxed up. We’re building those bonds and we’re grateful for anything that we get from Waitrose. They have been an incredible support all the way through, and we have great relationships with the staff.”
Following the pandemic and going straight into a cost of living crisis has meant that SHARE Wokingham is seeing an increase in people accessing their services for the first time.
“There’s a lot of people coming to us that are working full-time,” explains Claire. “There are teachers that come in during their lunch break. We’ve identified that there are people that are working, but their children aren’t eligible for free school meals. We also get people in that are a bit older – about 25% of people that come to us are of retirement age.
“Usually, the food is the first hook but there may well be lots of other issues that we can help with.
“A side effect that I hadn’t fully appreciated is social isolation. We recently had a guy in who said who wasn’t doing so well because he’d received a big bill and his gas and electricity had gone off - we can help with all of those things. It’s about building those relationships with people – we might not have all the answers, but we know where to signpost.
“The local council recognised early on that we had people coming to us for support who would struggle to go to a council office. Now, we have community engagement members attending to offer support for housing issues. We also have the NHS come in once a month to do mini health checks, like testing blood pressure, which can help to alleviate the issues before they become a bigger problem.”
To find out more about the work of SHARE Wokingham, visit their website: https://sharewokingham.co.uk/
