What can you give up for a food bank?

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Who remembers 22 meals for a coffee? A few months ago I urged readers to give up a luxury, like their morning latte, and instead buy the equivalent shopping for their local food bank, or donate £3 to the Trussell Trust by texting FBUK13 £3 to 70070.

Well the response was overwhelming, with hundreds of readers donating both by text and from their shopping baskets, and if you Google ’22 meals for a coffee’, it was mentioned on other peoples blogs far and wide.

But as new figures show that food bank use is still on the increase, it’s time for me to ask again if you can spare one little luxury that you might take for granted – be it your morning latte or takeaway breakfast, or that pint after work, or a packet of ten cigarettes – and instead donate the money to your local food bank, or to the Trussell Trust by texting FBUK13 £3 to 70070.

The Trussell Trust are launching a similar campaign tomorrow called Give It Up For Foodbanks – and I can’t emphasise enough that a three day emergency food box, or an extra three pounds, is absolutely crucial to some families.

I’ve got a list of suggested food bank donations that I wrote for the Women’s Institute and Urban Expression last week, and I’ve blogged it here.

Jack Monroe. Twitter: @MsJackMonroe.

Categories: Blog

12 Comments »

  1. we donated at work a couple of weeks ago and even persuaded our local tesco to donate a tenners worth of goods. amazingly i managed to talk sainburys into doing a permenant donation deal with the local foodbank (i’m still amazed) but i would like to mention (assuming someone has the massive choice of supermarkets that we do in portsmouth) that ten pounds filled a shopping bag full of staples in tesco (again, very grateful) but ten pounds filled three massive bags for life in the aldi.

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  2. I may not be able to do food. But I know the Isle of Wight food bank are doing school uniforms. I have a number of blue school shirts that seem to be now unacceptable to schools on IOW. Many are not worn and are still in their packages. any takers and I will gladly post them. They are ages from 7 -11

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  3. Done! No wonder families are struggling when food prices have gone up so much – shopping for seasonal veg last weekend was shocking when we compared the prices to last year, and certainly to three or four years ago. Horrible situation.

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  4. Just done an online shop with Tesco
    Adding a little extra for the food bank in Abingdon was a pleasure
    Keep up the food work Jack
    Your Twitter-Tante 🙂

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  5. Thanks for the reminder, Jack – I tweeted about this at the time and some of my followers donated. I now donate to Trussell monthly, it is so easy by text.

    Am going to think of other ways to help. As a teacher I’ve always had to buy uniform for a small number of children over the years but the lack of money to buy school shoes etc does seem to be getting worse in the last 2 years.

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  6. Thanks for the reminder. On the train to London today, usually buy a coffee at the station. Today I brought my own coffee with me in an insulated mug (£1.50, B&M Bargains!). Coffee money texted to Trussell Trust. So little effort for me, such a big difference to families in need. Keep on doing what you are doing, Jack.

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  7. We have no luxuries to give up, our monthly household budget once the bills are paid is £100 for two of us but I have been putting aside £1 a week to buy things for the FB and I challenge myself to see how much I can buy for my pound. Tesco value spaghetti is currently 20p a packet, so 5 went last week. Sainsbury have an offer on tomato paste with chilli – 25p so 4 tubes went this week.
    I keep an eye on supermarket bargains here
    http://www.hotukdeals.com/groceries/deals/hot

    and here
    http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=175
    which gives details of some superb offers.

    My daughter is a teacher and she took her sociology class to visit a food bank. They came back to school and raised £1,000 for their local foodbank and this is in a deprived area so well done to them.

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  10. Congratulations, Jack, you have taken a desperate situation and turned it to advantage others in need. That’s true humanity. Thanks for reminding us “haves” how we can so easily help the “have nots”. I’m off to Tescos in the morning with a list of your food bank suggestions and several shopping bags to fill!

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  12. I know food banks the majority is for food. But also toiletries. To make the person feel human again too as well as full.

    Conditioner.
    Shaving gel.
    Razers.
    Vitamins.
    Facial cream.
    Handcream.
    Vaseline. Any cheaper alternative.
    Pain killers.

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