If you donate to food banks..

[Novasmum]

Is it okay to donate activity packs for children and treats for parents such as face masks etc?

I have had a really rough couple of years financially. I lost my home, partner and I split making finances harder too. I am in a place now I am doing better and have regular work. I work with children and would love to put together packs for over the summer holidays and donate to the food bank. I’m just unsure if this is accepted? same with treats for parents, (obviously not alcohol)

thanks!

Try a beauty bank for the facemask they have them in boots

I hadn’t heard of them. Just looked, what a fabulous charity ! The small things really do help at hard times

Boots collect toiletries. You could always email or Facebook message your local food bank, they may run an appeal for activities/craft kits in the run up to summer holidays.

Food banks are struggling to give families the essentials so I’m afraid what you’re suggesting doesn’t sound so helpful, although it’s a lovely idea.

The local community run one does, the ones affiliated with nation wide organisations don’t.

I think there will be lots of ‘what a lovely idea’ OP responses but tbh I think food banks are what they say on the tin (no pun intended.) I know that they don’t just provide food but it’s really supposed to be essentials. So shampoo, soap, sanitary towels yes but face masks … no.

There are toy banks in some places, though.

It's probably best to contact your local one to ask directly.

My local supermarket has a board up at the entrance with a list of what the foodbank is currently running short of, I've seen toiletries on there but along the lines of shampoo/deodorant rather than nice to haves. Never seen anything like toys or activity packs.

There may be other charities running things for children over the school holidays near you that may like the activity packs. Might be worth asking your school if they've heard of anything/searching online for local activities and contacting the organisers.

Storage space is a problem for food banks so we ask people to try and donate from our list of shortage items so we can ensure we can make up bags of food with the right items. We often are short of pet food and toiletries as well as food.

In many supermarkets, there are lists of recommended items on the collection baskets - usually, as well as food, they list toiletries, baby items, sanitary protection and so on. The only thing they stipulate is no razors.

I volunteer at a Food Bank, it really is a good idea to contact your local FB to find out exactly what they need .. but generally speaking, basic food is much more useful than 'extras'. We get all sorts of random donations from well meaning people. .... but please, just stick to the basics ( or make a financial donation so that the FB can replace stock it needs). At Christmas and Easter we are overwhelmed with chocolates and Easter Eggs, but certainly at our FB we (fortunately) don't have many children and the average rough sleeper doesn't really want a fancy chocolate Easter Egg.

That’s really lovely of you. Trusses trust food banks give people a few bags of food then tell them to help themselves from crates on a table for some extra bits. So if you give face packs and kids activities packs then they may pop them in those crates for people to take. I recently donated to the food bank, they needed hand soap and dish soap but I wouldn’t see a problem with popping in some nice treats.

I forgot to mention I already donate food and toiletries. This is just something extra. I work with children and know some of them will go on the summer holidays and have nothing.

Give them money. It’s much easier for them to manage their stock to buy what they actually need, and more efficient to buy in bulk. I only donated at supermarkets to overtly model donating to DD, (who couldn’t see my bank transfers.)

The best way to help is to donate what the food bank is currently asking for (or money).

Our Foodbank would. We have ‘treats’ that we give out and face masks and activity packs would be welcome.

I have young people at work who sometimes use food banks and we occasionally get deliveries via the food bank for our pantry and I'd say that some of the things donated are so incredibly awkward that's it's almost comical.

Yes you can make quite a lot of things with a bag of lentils, but you need a fair amount of other things, plus the cooking equipment, energy supplies and knowledge to be able to do that. Ditto endless tins of new potatoes and cheap sliced carrots. Some of the people eat once a day (for and endless array of reasons) and a lot of the things donated and then distributed just aren't compatible with needing to be easy, quick, not requiring 34 different pans and utensils or a direct line to Jamie Oliver.

daisy - I quite agree ... it's all the pulses and quinoa that crack me up ... plus the dregs from Christmas Hampers - pate de foie gras was (unsurprisingly) not all popular .

Wow. If we have no fresh potatoes we put tinned potatoes in the pack. Same with carrots.

Do let me know what you would prefer and I’ll make a note.

Oh God, I forgot about my mother and her bloody lentils. I pointed out that they take a lot to cook and need a fair bit of faffing about with and additional ingredients. People using food banks maybe don’t have the fuel, energy or bloody inclination to dick about making lentil rosti or whatever, and maybe tins of beans or soup might be more helpful? She felt that people using food banks ‘generally aren’t English, dear’ so lentils would be fine. I suppose at least she felt these non-English-poor people were still worthy of help.

I’d get DD to choose a cereal and a pack of chocolate bars. I would add coffee or tea and some UHT milk and tampons. Anyone can eat them, anywhere - always needed. And keep for a couple of months if there’s a surplus.

she behaved SO much better with a choice to make, it was brilliant. (Even though she got plenty of choices about what we bought! I think it was the responsibility)

Can you donate opened boxes of sanitary products as I don’t think that I will ever need them again and it seems a shame to just bin them.

A food bank near me specifically wanted tinned potatoes at one point (As well as other tinned vegetables)
I usually try to put in things that would be easy to cook, baby wipes, sometimes washing powder and usually some biscuits/treats.

Can you donate opened boxes of sanitary products as I don’t think that I will ever need them again and it seems a shame to just bin them.

I wondered this about nappies and San pro but was told in another thread that it was not appropriate

I help run the foodbank at church and we have boxes where people can help themselves to sanpro. It’s def something that is donated a lot and always asked for. We run a baby bank so nappies go via there.

Thanks @PandaOrLion will see what ours say as I didn’t want to appear cheeky by handing in opened boxes but would hate to just bin.