A Slice of Bread and Butter
The voice of The Bread and Butter Thing - with stories from the frontline of the cost of living crisis from one of the UK's leading food charities.
A Slice of Bread and Butter
Team Talk: What goes on behind the scenes at Bread and Butter HQ
The final in our Team Talk mini series takes you behind the scenes to hear directly from the team at Bread and Butter HQ. Whilst these guys might not be out in our hubs everyday, they're busy making sure that things get to where they need to be and at the right time. This includes the all important food, organising the trucks carrying the food, texts to order the food and making sure people get the food. So pretty important stuff!
Welcome back to a slice of bread and butter with Mark and Alex from the Bread and Butter Thing. We're a charity that delivers affordable food to the heart of deprived neighbourhoods, to help nourish communities and act as a catalyst for change.
Speaker 2:We provide access to nutritious and affordable range of food, which means our members can save money on their shopping, feed their families healthfully, as well as access other support too, right in the heart of their communities yep, and this is where we share a slice of life of somebody involved in bread and butter and hear about how they connect with us, but this one's a bit of a special one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so this is a team chat, right? So this is get ready for chaos this is another one in the series of us talking to our team. Twice a year we get everybody together to tell them what's going on with bread and butter. But basically try and bring everybody together and tell them what wonderful things they're achieving and give them a slice of life, of bread and butter as well. So let's have a listen, okay, so we're going to introduce what we're talking about now.
Speaker 4:Okay, so we are talking about the difference between the food clubs and the food banks.
Speaker 5:You've got a dignity. I'm h? H hyperactive, which I am, unless I'm the total opposite. I'm in the food team and my brief is sourcing new food, and that is in the northeast, which is a lot harder than it sounds. The impact on me since I've worked here is just I thought I was kind of really super cool and aware of how difficult people's lives are and what food insecurity is.
Speaker 1:Like you, thought you were down with the kids, did you?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I did. I'm young, I'm vital, I'm in the prime of my life, but I think you know I'm quite I like to think.
Speaker 5:I'm quite socially aware and one of the reasons I came here was food insecurity and poverty and social justice are things that are really important to me. Working here, it really opens your eyes realising how little people have really impactful things like people having £50 left at the end of a month is just a disgrace. And that's working people, it's non-workingworking people, it's everybody in between and all different ages, so that's been a big one for me. Also thought I was quite aware of where my food comes from and food waste and my days. Yeah, that's a bigger issue than I thought it was. So anybody that stops and looks at me these days gets told about stuff like that. You have any idea how big of a problem this is.
Speaker 5:Me and my grandma split our veg and things like that, and I think, it's helping me, and one of my personal missions this year is to live more sustainably. So throwing less away, of course, and using less packaging and things like that. Think about where things come from. So, yeah, that's me.
Speaker 1:I feel like we had're going to get a Hayley podcast.
Speaker 5:I feel like we're going to get a.
Speaker 3:Hayley podcast.
Speaker 6:We've got a Hayley podcast coming on. Stay tuned. H.
Speaker 1:Hayley.
Speaker 6:So I currently organise the additional services for the North West. So that's looking for new partners, keeping our current partners.
Speaker 1:What do you mean by a partner?
Speaker 6:A local organisation or a charity or something like that who will go into the community and offer support to people that might need it. And that's kind of around four main themes income maximization, help with energy bills, health and well-being and digital inclusion. And that's based off the survey. So that's what our members tell us they need extra support with.
Speaker 6:You always hear lovely things as well about how welcome they feel in the hubs, just from kind of the cddos as well and all the volunteers, and that's always lovely to hear. And then it's nice to hear as well when it does go right. So you hear some fantastic stories about how much money people have saved from additional services being there and the difference that they make. And I think I always see this job as linking people in with services that might not walk through their door otherwise if you're not in going on to the food waste element of it and how creative the members can be. I was talking to one woman who was like if I get stuff I don't know what to do with, I just take a photo of it and google it and like the assumption that maybe there's a digital exclusion element and there is, but also but they're savvy, they're very savvy and you always speak to people that know how to spot a bargain and know how to shop savvily.
Speaker 6:So, yeah, I think you get that in the hubs as well savvily so yeah, I think you get that in the hubs as well. There's often stigma around them. You usually need a referral and can only use in a certain amount of times, and they usually only offer like tinned and ambient goods hello, I'm justin.
Speaker 8:I'm in the food team and I've worked at the bread and butter thing for five years, which is a long time, I guess.
Speaker 1:I remember the way Justin started at bread and butter is because Justin was a mate. Is a mate present tense.
Speaker 5:When did you fall out?
Speaker 1:And during COVID, you did a lot of volunteering, didn't you?
Speaker 8:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I was driving him home one day and and he said why have? You not offered me a job yet and it's, it's true, genuinely.
Speaker 8:I volunteered. I was on gardening leave from my previous job. My other half said to me basically, get out the house and go and do some work.
Speaker 8:You drive me nuts because um, she said the same to me actually yeah, and I went to volunteer at the Bread and Butter thing and I fell in love with the place. I just fell in love with the team, what the Bread and Butter thing represents and what it does for communities and people, and that was the start of a love affair, actually, with the Bread and Butter thing. And I still love everything I do for the Bread and Butter thing five years later and I've done a range of jobs within the organisation. So I've been a CDDO, which is a Community Development Delivery Officer, going out into the community, working in the warehouse, serving the members. During COVID I sort of ran a warehouse whilst we were doing all of our shopping in bags.
Speaker 1:You say warehouse, but during COVID it was an exhibition centre, wasn't it it?
Speaker 8:was an exhibition centre. Yeah, that was pretty epic.
Speaker 3:It was an exhibition centre. Yeah, that was pretty epic. It was really epic and I actually lost.
Speaker 8:I think about a stone and a half with the distance, do you not have a stone and a half to lose?
Speaker 8:I averaged that year 21,000 steps a day, averaged, running around chasing pallets with bags of shopping on, which was really exciting and it felt like we did something special. But you forget, think, sometimes, because we're so busy doing things that we do special things every day. But we do that because we care about the people in our communities and the one thing I've taken from this is just how much of an impact getting nutritious food to families makes, and it goes way beyond just what they're putting in their bodies, what they're cooking and eating, whether it's mental health, it's friendships and communities that we're bringing together, and that bit I just it makes me feel emotional and yeah, it really does. To go and meet people and some of the stories that you you get and some of the people that you meet, I have genuinely cried a few times because people's stories are just so horrific and this is normal, everyday people that are just struggling and that's the scary stuff, right that it's everyday people.
Speaker 1:This isn't crisis that you're looking at. This isn't the bottom five percent or whatever. This is just everyday working people. Nanny, annie, that's me. What do you do then?
Speaker 7:So, like Hayley, I provide opportunities for external partners to visit our hubs. I mainly do that in the North East. So charities, organisations like Groundwork, green Doctor Citizens Advice whether that be MIND, a mental health charity, and, just picking up on what people have said, the importance of our members feeling supported. Really, I think for a long time, especially since Covid, a lot of our members have lost their sense of worth, their self-esteem, their confidence, their ability to cross the door and perhaps go and ask for help. What Hayley and I do is provide the opportunity within that hub location, provide the opportunity within that hub location. So it's right there and we've got organisations that are happy to approach our members in a really non-judgmental way. Just the importance of chatting, getting a brew and offering help and support to people.
Speaker 1:Somebody said to me the other day, nanny Annie, that it's going to stick. It's going to stick, nanny Annie. That community is lost. I think we're doing our bit to bring it back.
Speaker 7:Oh, we're doing more than our bit, without a doubt. Just from looking at our survey results, our members feeling less isolated, more part of a community, able to make friends and feel socially included it's huge, isn't it.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I think the desire for community is definitely there. As we've discussed, I'm very young and in the prime of my life, but I've got a very old head on my shoulders and during COVID that sense of community really came back. For people.
Speaker 1:This isn't a Tinder pitch.
Speaker 5:And a lot of us loved it and it got very quickly. It fell by the wayside again so I get people thinking that communities lost are feeling it especially yeah older generations that have had that it was.
Speaker 1:It was a government official that said it.
Speaker 5:Oh really okay, I mean. Well, we know how well they often reflect what we really think, don't we so um? But, yeah I think there's definitely that desire for it and we as an organization and a community ourselves are helping to bring that back.
Speaker 7:Yeah, we definitely pave the way, don't we? You just have to listen to our members and look at the delight when they arrive and see what they get. And they've actually made friends at our hubs and they've had like that good ketchup and a cuppa and a cake.
Speaker 8:It's just the fact that everybody knows everybody when you get there. I love the fact that you've got a bunch of amazing volunteers eagerly waiting at the back of the van to open the doors, to see what's in the van today, what food have we got? What have we got for our members? It's just, you know, it's a buzz. It's exciting every time for everybody.
Speaker 7:And the volunteer team at each hub that welcomes our members, that knows our members by their first name. What Hayley said about how our partnerships feel when they attend they're made to feel so welcome.
Speaker 3:Our team members are amazing. The members are amazing.
Speaker 7:Yeah, we said, food banks are more of a vulnerable place to be. It's more more about crisis, whereas a food club can be educational, healthy. Of course, we're sustainable because we're fabulous and we ooze charisma yeah, so I'm sam.
Speaker 4:I'm part of the member services team, so what that means is, when texts are coming through, I'm the person that's sort of receiving them, so filtering through that, making sure that if people are wanting to register, move hubs, sort of have any queries about what time, where, when anything like that I can actually go through and sort of help people with that. But then I also then look at the lists, making sure that they're allocated as fairly as possible, so I don't really get to go out much. I've been here now two years.
Speaker 1:We've locked you in a cupboard for two years. Have you been out once?
Speaker 4:Yeah, I've been out a handful of times. Unfortunately not as much as everyone else, because my job is obviously making sure that there is someone answering those queries.
Speaker 3:If you didn't do your job, Sam, then nobody would have any food, oh yeah, and.
Speaker 4:I get almost an alternative perspective. So it's a weird feeling now that I've been here quite a while, seeing people register, watching their name appear on the list every week and then eventually going thank you so much, I don't actually need this service anymore. Seeing them be able to say I'm able to support myself more now and they actually don't require our support is whilst I don't get to see their face and actually understand who they are. It's quite nice seeing it from that perspective.
Speaker 1:Do you know that is the first time you've shared that, Sam. Normally we have a giggle about the rude ones you get.
Speaker 7:It does brighten my day up a little bit and, let's face it, you do get some very random texts.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, I mean, I think there are a lot of people who don't realize who they're applying to sometimes, so we do get the odd there is a human being yes, it's not sam bond it's actually, sam, you have had a breakup though
Speaker 4:yes, I think it was in maybe my first month or two. We got almost an a4 page breakup text which was quite entertaining and then followed by a. I'm really sorry this wasn't meant for you, but before starting here I worked for a bank in their customer service and forward team and, as satisfying and self-fulfilling as it was, I knew that realistically there wasn't necessarily any major help that I was providing people, whereas working here I've been able to see those people develop and step away and then even learning more about surplus food that we get. I mean, I definitely had a slight different perspective on what the food was that we were getting. And then I remember one day Justin had come into the office and said that we were getting all of these cauliflower, which is one of my favourite vegetables, and the reason we were getting them is because they were too big for the supermarkets and so actually sort of seeing that and being like that shouldn't be surplus food, like that's perfectly fine food that supermarkets can sell.
Speaker 1:So it sort of changed my perspective on it is an entirely separate episode on it's own, isn't it?
Speaker 8:I do the outgrades episode biggest courgettes I've ever seen.
Speaker 1:I mean, they're like yeah, the two kilo parsnips the two kilo parsnips, it was like a two-hand carry for a parsnip, was it sweet potato?
Speaker 8:earrings. Oh yeah, yes, they were the size of our heads, vick.
Speaker 3:They were. That was in our warehouse days, where me and you were in the trenches.
Speaker 8:Yeah, very much so.
Speaker 3:And then we got all of these sweet potatoes and we're trying to clear the warehouse.
Speaker 8:They were just enormous.
Speaker 5:The size and shape and variety. But you know the situation we're in, where like no, no, you only want carrots that are this size or shape, or you only want a cauliflower that's this size, but you will pay £2 for it is ridiculous and that's not really what any of us want.
Speaker 3:And the cauliflowers in the supermarkets recently have been tiny.
Speaker 8:Tiny, really tiny, that's what we want, Vic?
Speaker 5:We want really small ones that we can just eat.
Speaker 3:It's like trinclation with veggies in it. It is yeah.
Speaker 4:So when I first started couple weeks, vic had shared a recipe with myself and one of the girls who used to work here, which was cauliflower tacos which became a weekly staple for us and hasn't shared it with me yet or me, can I just say all right okay, I'll get it shared around, it's fine
Speaker 8:well, I've got to say, when we get to June again and we have the, we have these seasonal gluts, don't we? Of food, and June is courgette gate.
Speaker 3:I've got the most amazing courgette recipe. Is it courgette cake? No, it's like summer in a plate. It's gorgeous.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm feeling we've gone off on a tangent now, so I'm going to wrap it up, okay well, that was just like listening to one of our stand-ups.
Speaker 2:The meetings where we all sit down go off on a tangent, which they do do regularly.
Speaker 1:They do, they do. But isn't it great to hear that camaraderie and that golden thread going through everybody again about values and how everybody's life is touched so much by everything we do.
Speaker 2:It was. It warms the cockles, doesn't it? And just in saying that, it does make you realise that special things are achieved every day by everybody in the organisation. It reminds you of why we came here in the first place.
Speaker 1:So we do this podcast right and we get so many stories and all the rest of it One of the things that maybe doesn't come across. I was out of the hub in Altrincham just the other day with another corporate right and they were completely bowled over because they went into somebody's community but they were invited in and welcomed right and they just got overwhelmed by the stories that were just told on the day sharing, sharing and how positive and engaged it was. And I think the team chat really shows that, because I think it's really important. It doesn't normalize yes, because it's not normal. We get such an opportunity and a privilege to go into these communities and be welcomed and shared and involved and all the rest of it, and that's what touches me, but it's just remembering that actually it's something special.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely yeah. I couldn't agree more, and hearing that it did give you a real sense of the bigger picture.
Speaker 1:Although, just to drill right back in, we probably need to explain what Nanny Annie is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, go on.
Speaker 1:So Annie is one of our team members up in the North East, but her daughter also works for us as a CDDO. Megan, yeah, and Megan's pregnant. Oh, nanny, annie, and Megan's pregnant, oh, nanny Annie. Nanny Annie is very, very proud at the moment. She's beaming, isn't?
Speaker 2:she Beaming. Well, I feel really quite lucky because it's a Hayley sandwich. I'm sandwiched between both Hayleys and I see what they're up to and how hard they work every day, and it was lovely to hear them wax lyrical about what they do. I want that cauliflower tacos recipe too.
Speaker 3:Vic Get sharing please yeah, come on, Vic Harper.
Speaker 2:It struck me, though, the two big cauliflowers is a bit like oh my goodness, my golden shoes are too tight. It's crazy, isn't it? It is that's why some of the food that we get would be headed to landfill. Yeah, that shocks me on a daily basis, especially sitting opposite the food team.
Speaker 1:I get that. I guess I'm over that. There's nothing shocks me in that. But I also liked the way the guys did the exercise that Vic arranged to talk about the differences between a food club and a food bank.
Speaker 2:Yeah, did the exercise, that vicarage to talk about the differences between a food club and a food bank? Yeah, and I think it's good to remind so, because I'm speaking to preston mountain hubs, spitting out the key messages all the time, I forget that other people might not live and breathe that I think you're right.
Speaker 2:It's one of the other reasons why we do these kind of gatherings, because it's just that ability to just stop and reflect right yeah, I've got to a point now where if, for any reason, an external party has accidentally described us as a food bank, it hurts.
Speaker 1:I'm like oh, yeah, no yeah. Well, you could take it as a challenge, though, and just recognise that you've got to do more to educate everybody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:He says raging inside.
Speaker 2:And do you know what it made me smile? I suddenly thought Sam, the voice behind the texts that she is the epicentre of everything goes on on a daily basis. And the fact that she gets the epicenter of everything goes on on a daily basis, and the fact that she gets to see people progress to the next step. I'm going to be hitting her up for a few potential names, because I think so, I think so I was rubbing my hands when I heard that and geeky fact for sam as well.
Speaker 1:So sam sends all of our texts and she sent 5.8 million text messages last year?
Speaker 2:Have you told her that yeah, yeah, yeah. What did she say?
Speaker 1:She wasn't surprised, but that's Sam yeah. I bet she will mentally work that out with each send so if you'd like to know more about the bread and butter thing and what we get up to, you can find us at team tbbt on instagram, twitter and tiktok on linkedin or online at bread and butter thingorg. I could see you actually ticking that off as I was saying it.
Speaker 2:I was and if you have any feedback or thoughts on the podcast, you can get in touch with us by email at podcast at breadandbutterthingorg, or pop us a message on any of the social channels that Mark's just mentioned.
Speaker 1:DMs. Dm me, slide into me DMs lastly, we're always open to new members at all the Waterhubs, so if you or someone you know would benefit from our affordable food scheme, you can find your nearest hub on the Become a Member page of our website and like us and subscribe and leave us a review and share us with your pals and chat about us on social please and tell your dad and your mum.
Speaker 2:And your second cousin once we're moved.
Speaker 1:And Auntie Mary. We'll see you next time. Bye.
