A Slice of Bread and Butter

CDDO Jenny gets to the heart of Bread and Butter life

• The Bread and Butter Thing • Season 1 • Episode 17

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We're back! After a bit of a hiatus, our Slice of Life podcast returns with Mark and a new voice, Alex the Marketing Manager. Join them for well deserved sit down with one of Bread and Butter's long-standing Community Development and Distribution Officers Jenny, to talk about making a difference, the importance of humour and spring onion juice.

Mark:

Hi, uh, hi, where's Fiona?

Alex:

I don't know, and I don't know why you're asking me, as I'm the new one.

Mark:

True? So I guess it's me and you. Now, Yep, who are you?

Alex:

I'm the new marketing manager. I started a couple of weeks ago now and I'm really not quite sure I'm having to tell you this, because you hired me.

Mark:

Okay, my bad, I was just trying to create some useful content so you know listeners could actually find out who you are without me saying hi, alex, welcome to the team. Please introduce yourself. Blah, blah, blah.

Alex:

Okay, shall I do that?

Mark:

now, then I think we've just done it, don't you welcome back to a slice of bread and butter with mark and alex from the bread and butter thing?

Alex:

we're a charity that drives affordable food to the heart of deprived neighborhoods to help nourish communities and act as a catalyst for change we offer a nutritious range of food at deeply discounted rates, which means our members can save money on their shopping, feed their families healthfully and also access other support too, right in the heart of their communities.

Mark:

This is the place where we meet and we share a slice of life from somebody involved in bread and butter and hear about how they connect with us.

Alex:

And a big part of this, as I discovered on my first day, is the team that work on the vans and in the warehouses. I spent my first couple of days working in a warehouse in Trafford and I've got to tell you I was pretty knackered after that first day. Respect to the team.

Mark:

Yeah, they're brilliant and it's bloody hard work, right? So I spoke to Jenny, one of the team in trafford, and she's a ton of fun and just oozes the values that the entire team share that's one of the first things I noticed about bread and butter the values that everybody shares. It's all very special yeah, you're gonna have to stop it, as I get dead soppy about the team and the effort they put in. I'm like a super proud dad.

Alex:

Oh bless Shall, we have a listen then.

Mark:

Yeah.

Jenny:

The day I go in 7 o'clock, 8 o'clock, go in the warehouse and there's the magic people in the office get a lot of food in the warehouse, and then we then We've got magic. Fair people in the office get a lot of food in the warehouse, and then we, then We've got magic fairies in the office now. Yeah, magic fairies at the office. They just load the warehouse full of food.

Mark:

Yeah.

Jenny:

So either we'll go out in the van and go and collect some up to five pallets and bring it back, or we'll start getting the pallets together to then put on the vans. So every van has up to 80 members. Every member has three bags of food. Every bag is around six, seven items in the bag and then make sure that there's enough chill food, fruit and veg food and ambient food on the van for that hub.

Mark:

So that sounds like a lot of lifting.

Jenny:

Yeah.

Mark:

Keeps you fit.

Jenny:

Keeps you very fit. Probably cry in a corner for your first week.

Mark:

Is that what you did?

Jenny:

About two, but it's a good job, it's an active job and it keeps you fit. Then you've got that for about two, maybe three hours. Right, then what? And then?

Mark:

for about two, maybe three hours. Right Then what?

Jenny:

And then you drive to your hub. So your hub could be anywhere in the Manchester area. So what is a hub? It could be a community school, it could be a church, it could be any building where the community can get together.

Mark:

Okay.

Jenny:

So then, when we get to the hubs, we'll unload the vans, the volunteers will pack the bags at the hubs for the members to then come and purchase the bags of food for 8.50.

Mark:

How many volunteers?

Jenny:

It ranges, sometimes there's four or six, sometimes there's 20. Wow, yeah, it works really well with six volunteers.

Mark:

That's your sweet spot, is it?

Jenny:

Six is nice. It's not too many, but sometimes you get loads of people. It depends how big the place is, how well people get on in that area as well, and then they'll do it once and then quite enjoy it, and then that's their weekly thing. Then they'll ask someone, and then they'll ask someone, and then, before you know it, you've got overrun with volunteers.

Mark:

It's great so tell me about the volunteers and what they like the every walk of life you can think of a brain surgeon yeah, could be, absolutely could be.

Jenny:

They're just people in their local area who like the idea of this, who come to help out. There's one in particular that loves squirrels. She goes for miles and miles to buy special nuts for them.

Mark:

Hang on Special nuts. What do you mean by special nuts?

Jenny:

Just special nuts that she thinks that they're like. So she won't go to like the local shop and get a bag of nuts. She'll go for miles to get some different kind of nuts for her squirrels.

Mark:

Are they squirrels at the hub? Yeah, okay.

Jenny:

Yeah, they're in the backyard. They actually come up to her and sit on the chair next to her while she feeds them. It's called Oliver.

Mark:

So we've got Ollie. I think I know Ollie and I think I know the person that you're on about. Yeah, because it's in older minute yeah, yeah she's brilliant. Yeah, so she's one. But I get that you're a little bit nervous right now, and this isn't the Jenny I know. Really, the Jenny I know likes to shout across the yard at me and tell you I'm still here, I'm still here well, there is a story behind that.

Jenny:

To be fair, share it. When I did my interview and you said I'm not being funny, but someone your age, what last six months? I'd better stay for six months. Do you know what?

Mark:

I'm pretty certain I didn't quite say that.

Jenny:

I'm pretty certain you did, but it's nearly two years now.

Mark:

I know it's amazing, isn't it?

Jenny:

Yeah, so I think I've proven that fact.

Mark:

Yeah, for sure.

Jenny:

That us old uns can do the job as well.

Mark:

It wasn't an ageist comment whatsoever, it was not I know that it's hard. It's hard graph writing yeah. And I'm 55 and I've done it and when I've done a day on the van, I feel it.

Jenny:

Yeah, it's hard work. I've done some jobs and it's nearly killed me.

Mark:

Well, I'm glad to know you're still around.

Jenny:

Yeah.

Mark:

So you've been here for two years. It's been a bloody hard graft, right.

Jenny:

Yeah.

Mark:

So why do you do it?

Jenny:

I like it. I enjoy the physical work and the meeting people. I love it. You don't know where you're going to be, so you're at different places every day. You're meeting different people and just people's stories and lives. I could sit and listen to it all day long. I love it. From every walk of life I can hear the troubles and stories and I could literally just sit and listen to them all day long.

Mark:

I love the fact that when we go in as Bread and Butter, we're just seen as part of their community and they'll just share.

Jenny:

Yeah.

Mark:

One of the main aims of Bread and Butter, we say, is to amplify the voices of our members, because a lot of people that share with us in their communities they're not stories that many people hear outside in the big wide world and they're hidden.

Jenny:

Yeah.

Mark:

And the stuff that they have to go through and the struggles that they have.

Jenny:

No, it's heartbreaking. Some of it is absolutely heartbreaking. Yeah, there's one member that sticks out. She's over the time of going to the hub, got to know her and you could kind of see a difference in the way that she was and her demeanour. You know, sometimes she just looked tired, fed up, a bit dishevelled in a way. And then the more I got to know her and the more she felt comfortable, the more she'd open up and you could see her, especially over a year period, looking better, looking happier. She told me a story one day. We were just having a cup of tea before service. How I didn't cry in front of her was just yeah, yeah.

Jenny:

And this is someone's life and what they had to live through. She was in an abusive relationship and she took to drink. She lost her kids, she lost her house. Her partner then left her, so she's left with nothing. A house partner then left her, so she's left with nothing. And then eventually she got past the alcohol and managed to get rid of that and now she's back in her job when she lost everything and she's managed to go full circle back into it.

Mark:

So how did we get to know her then?

Jenny:

She was just coming in just every week just getting her bags. It'd be like hi, you OK? Yep, over the time that we'd been there she'd kind of open up and just say oh yeah, I've had a bit of a bad week this week, but you know next week's better, and just little bits of conversations. And then one day it's like so do you, bro? So I just did her a cup of tea and then just sat and said you know how you're doing, you're looking well. And then that was it. It's like the floodgates had opened. She just told me everything that had been going on but it's lovely to see the journey, isn't it?

Jenny:

yeah, from start to back, and she's like all this time she's got so much going on.

Mark:

It's just heartbreaking that people's stories but it's really human and that's what I like about it. It's just everything we do is just about the community and the people yeah and that you know as well as I do. It's all about food, right, because if we don't have food, we don't have bread and butter, yeah, but ultimately, that food is just to actually feed and support the people, and everything that we do revolves around all those people.

Jenny:

Yeah, of course it does.

Mark:

You've been here two years right and I'm still amazed you're still here so congratulations.

Jenny:

It's fantastic. I'm quite surprised about myself as well.

Mark:

Any funny moments.

Jenny:

Oh, at the time it wasn't funny. Oh, I cried all the way home and I stunk my fourth day in the company and I'm hurting, I'm tired. It was hot God, it was hot as well. It was so hot in the summer. I didn't think I'd ever known temperatures like it. So in the end I had to go and waste some spring onions. Okay, that had been in the warehouse a bit too long.

Mark:

Too hot, they turned.

Jenny:

Yeah Well, I fell in them. I fell in the spring onions. I grazed money and I got spring onion juice in my mouth. Spring onions don't have juice.

Mark:

I need more detail. Were they in boxes?

Jenny:

They were loose in little plastic trays.

Mark:

Right. And I fell into the whole pallet of it and you kind of Obviously knocking it over as well bathed in spring onion juice.

Jenny:

Yeah, rolled about it, got it in my mouth, cut my knee. One of the other staff obviously found it hilarious, so because someone else was laughing at me, I couldn't cry in my puddle of self-pity.

Mark:

Or your puddle of spring onion juice, spring onion juice.

Jenny:

So I got up and then I cleaned it all up and then it was time to go home and I stunk and I sat in my car and I cried all the way from Trafford to Ashton and I vowed that I was never going back again and that it was just ridiculous.

Mark:

Jenny, that is so tragic, but so funny at the same time.

Jenny:

It was awful. It was the worst day ever, but I was back the next day.

Mark:

I was going to say that's what I love about you, that resilience.

Jenny:

My car stunk for three days. Oh God, Three actual days. It smelled of spring onion juice.

Mark:

Okay, so I'm feeling that's a low in your bread and butter career.

Jenny:

It's probably the lowest. Yeah Well, I was on the floor, so Can't get any lower than that really.

Mark:

Have you got any highs?

Jenny:

Oh, every day. I think you know it's hard work, it's hard graft, it's stressful sometimes, but there's just that one person that you see every day that just is so happy just to be at their house and to see somebody else and that you've made their day, and that, to me, is the high of every day. It's why I keep coming back and crying and rolling in juice.

Mark:

Yeah, top tip don't roll in spring onions.

Jenny:

No, it's not nice, and the staff as well. The guys that we work with. You just have such a giggle at each other mainly, you know, pointing and laughing at each other, but it's like the camaraderie is there. We all know each other's struggles. When someone's had a bad day, we help them out and it's just a really nice place to be.

Mark:

Well, I think we're going to have to end there, because you're ending on a high and that's fantastic. So thank you, jenny.

Jenny:

Not a problem.

Alex:

Who knew spring onions could be so dangerous?

Mark:

I know right, but I've got total respect for Jenny. She is so down to earth, takes everything in its ride and it's been rough at times, but she simply just keeps going because the members just keep reminding her why she does it, she's clearly an absolute legend and a load of fun, but is it as hard a job as she says? Depends really Everyone we recruit and it's weird, right, Because we always tell them that the job is more outdoorsy and more physical than they think it is.

Alex:

and if you can cope with that and the random nature of surplus food with a smile on your face come rain or shine, then it's all good it was lovely and sunny when I did it, but I can imagine it getting a whole lot harder very quickly when the temperature drops and it rains and after all, we are in manchester yep, and if you forget your coat on that rainy day, it'll be the last time you forget your coat. These guys are hardcore.

Mark:

Yeah, season pros, but they have a giggle doing it and we think they're great, just like all the volunteers we have, and we'll have a chat about some of the volunteers in other episodes.

Alex:

I look forward to it, but I'm busting to know why do we call them CDDOs?

Mark:

to it, but I'm busting to know. Why do we call them CDDOs? Yeah, that is a bloody good question, right? So I don't have a straight answer to that. We literally made it up seven years ago for a funding bid and still struggle with it. It stands for Community Development and Delivery Officer, and I think we just like long names around here. Still don't think it fits them, though. These guys are out there every day, working front and back of house, organising food in the warehouse, on the vans, working with volunteers, basically doing it with a smile and a chat, and I think they're just magic. What would you call them? Heroes?

Alex:

I'm not sure yet, but if anybody out there has a better idea for a name than we want to hear from you, email us at podcast at breadandbutterthingorg.

Mark:

Clean ones, please. And if you'd like to know more about the Bread and Butter Thing and what we get up to, you can find us at TimTBBT, on Instagram and Twitter, on LinkedIn or online at breadandbutterthingorg.

Alex:

And if you have any feedback or thoughts on the podcast how good it is, how bad it is get in touch with us by email. On the same email podcast at breadandbutterthingorg.

Mark:

Lastly, we are always open to new members at all of our hubs. If you or someone you know would benefit from our affordable food scheme, you can find your nearest hub on the join us pages of the website.

Alex:

And don't like to beg, but please do all the things that podcasts ask you to do. Like us, subscribe, leave us a review, share us with your friends and chat about us on social. We want to hear from you.

Mark:

Yeah, and tell your mum, and tell your mum to tell her friends see you next time.

Alex:

How did I do bang on welcome aboard? See you next time.

Mark:

How did I do Bang on? Welcome aboard. See you next time.

Alex:

I made it.

People on this episode

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Fiona Williams

Host
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Mark Game

Host