Food Manufacturers Have a Duty of Care Too. What Are You Doing to Support Your Community This Winter?

Currently in the UK, 15% of UK households are living in food insecurity – that is approximately eight million adults and three million children¹. The Flava People are calling on food and drink manufacturers to step up to the plate and support their local communities, especially as we head into winter months which puts increasing pressure on households faced with mounting utilities bills alongside putting food on the table. 

In February 2024, The Flava People officially announced its partnership with The Community Grocery. A new type of grocery store, The Community Grocery bridges the gap between food banks and discounter / supermarkets for those who need support to feed their families. Working with businesses, The Community Grocery redistributes surplus food such as fresh fruit and vegetables, as well as packaged and canned goods, to those who need it. However, this is not a food bank. Instead, The Community Grocery strives to offer support by bringing down the cost of the weekly shop, offering 12 items for just £5 with additional top up products available, saving shoppers around £10-30 on an average supermarket trip.

United by their joint passion for community, family, and food affordability and accessibility, since announcing the partnership The Flava People have built support for The Community Grocery into their daily operations. From donating team time alongside surplus stock and ingredients to their ‘Give-A-Shop’ initiative, alongside donating 3p from every sachet of seasoning sold in order to help fund and set up a new Community Grocery store on their doorstep in South Manchester. As of end of August 2024, the team has raised an astonishing £18,000 of their goal of £30,000 by the end of the year. 

However, Scott Dixon and the team at The Flava People know their contribution alone is not enough and is calling on more FMCG businesses to do their part to help those in need as the cost-of-living continues to bear down on UK households, leaving more people and more families in food poverty. With over 12,000 food and drink manufacturing businesses in the UK, the collaborative impact could be momentous². 

Scott Dixon, Managing Director at The Flava People: “The Community Grocery is incredible. What started out as one location in Manchester has grown into an organisation supporting over 53,000 families each week, led still by the ever-humble Sam and Andy Hawthorne. While the team try to buy as much of their stock as possible, the demand and need – sadly – seems to only be growing, meaning to meet this and support as many people and families as possible, donated products are crucial in ensuring families can continuing accessing a resource as precious as a Community Grocery store.

“Those of us who make food and drink products need to think – what are we doing to support those in need in our communities. The nature of our businesses mean we often have surplus or short-dated product which has the potential to simply be wasted or generate very low returns. It is not good enough and we need to collectively make a change. Businesses don’t have to reach for the stars – we understand many of our colleagues have been through tough times of their own recently. However, by making one small business change we collectively have the potential to have a tidal effect on not just one person, but thousands of people’s lives. Asking to businesses donate what they can, even if they can only tick off one item from the list, is not a big ask. These are essentials most of us will take for granted. “

By supporting The Community Grocery, it not only helps people in the here and the now. Their model sets out to make lasting change, supporting and enabling people to get back on their feet quicker with a free wrap around service in addition to providing discount groceries, including courses which cover essential topics from debt management, cooking classes, job clubs, and more. What’s perhaps most interesting for industry colleagues in FMCG, is that their key overriding objective is to channel people out of their stores and into the major retailers to buy the products and brands on offer there.”

With twenty-four current stores, partnering with The Community Grocery would help provide more meals and open more stores to keep millions more people fed as well as equipping them with the resources they need to overcome food insecurity. Money to build new groceries is just one part of the solution. Without products, The Community Grocery cannot help families. Running on the goodwill of volunteers and donations, in addition to the support it offers, The Community Grocery has saved 6,000 tonnes of surplus food from landfill in the process.

As a family-run business that is all about providing people with game-changing dinners, this initiative is especially important to The Flava People, aligning with the company’s own mission and values. The full list of items in need by The Community Grocery includes: