Posted:
Tuesday - February 27, 2024
1:24 pm
FareShare Midlands is delighted to announce that Tesco, one of our long-standing food partners, has generously donated two of its former home delivery vans to support our work in the region. These vans will enable us to distribute more surplus food to charities and community groups that feed vulnerable people across the Midlands.FareShare Midlands is the region’s largest food redistribution charity, supporting around 500 local charities and community organisations, and redistributing almost 6,000 tonnes of surplus food each year. Tesco is the largest supermarket chain in the UK and one of the top five food and beverage retailers in Europe.
Tesco has been working with FareShare for over 10 years, providing us with millions of meals every year from good quality surplus food. This food helps us to fight hunger and food waste, and to support people who are struggling to afford a balanced diet.
The two vans that Tesco has donated are state-of-the-art Mercedes Sprinters 314CDIs, with a payload of 860kg. They have three separate chambers for ambient, chilled and frozen food, with temperature control to ensure food safety and quality. These vans can hold up to 120 trays of food each, which means we can deliver more food in fewer trips. This is the equivalent of delivering 2,048 meals each trip and means we can deliver an extra 532,400 meals over the year from each van.
The vans are based at our Nechells depot in Birmingham, where our volunteer drivers will use them to deliver food to our member organisations across the Midlands. These include homeless shelters, school breakfast clubs, community cafes, domestic violence refuges, community centres, faith organisations and homeless shelters. By having these vans, we can also reduce our fuel and haulage costs, and increase our resilience in the face of rising prices and demand.
Tesco has also kindly branded the vans with the FareShare Midlands and Tesco logos, which will help us to raise awareness of our partnership and our mission wherever we go. We are very grateful to Tesco for this gesture, as well as for their ongoing support and collaboration.
Marc Green, Head of Fundraising at FareShare Midlands, said: “These vans are a fantastic gift from Tesco, and we are over the moon with them. They will make a huge difference to our operations and our ability to reach more people in need with nutritious food. Tesco has been a great partner for us, and we thank them for their generosity and smooth donation process.”Rob Smallwood, Fleet Service Operations Manager at Tesco, said: “We are extremely proud to support FareShare providing meals for those that need them with surplus food from our stores. The donation of these two former Tesco delivery vans to FareShare Midlands will allow them to make deliveries and feed people in communities across the region more easily.”
We want to say a big thank you to Tesco for their incredible support and commitment to FareShare Midlands. Together, we are making a positive impact on the lives of thousands of people in the region who face hunger and food insecurity every day.
We are always looking for generous, philanthropic organisations to work with us as corporate partners. If you are able to lend a hand, please visit this page: https://www.faresharemidlands.org.uk/corporate-partnerships/
You can find out more here in respect of:
• https://www.faresharemidlands.org.uk/
• https://www.tescoplc.com/
END
PHOTO: Andrew Moore, FareShare Midlands Transport Manager
NOTES TO EDITORS
To discuss this press release please contact:
Stella Broster, Communications Manager, FareShare Midlands
e: stella.broster@faresharemidlands.org.uk, t: 07510 318837
