Community pantry - what would make you join?

[AquaFaba]

Looking for some advice, please. Along with a couple of others living in our small town, we are looking into setting up a community pantry.
For those who might be unfamiliar with the term, this is where people pay a small fee per visit (eg, £5) and receive a heavily subsidised basket of groceries, with a value of around £15-20.

It's proving a lot harder than we envisaged to set this up, namely as we don't have a fixed, permanent venue where we can install fridges and freezers. Although we have the kind offer of a church hall, we won't be able to store goods there either; it will simply be a distribution point.

We have tried to find a fixed venue to no avail. My worry is that if we are only offering tinned/dried goods, this is going to make our offer far less attractive - and I don't think people will be so interested in paying to use a community pantry with such a limited range.

My ask is for anyone here who has experience of using a community pantry. What can we do in such limited circumstances? What would you want to pay for ?
Thanks

By community pantry, you mean slightly above a food bank?

In my local (specific) food bank, they have a storeroom in the local religious centre where they store dried /tinned goods and then on distribution day they buy in specific fresh items as they know a) how many people are coming b) people will definitely need that item.

They make up (pre covid and post) pre set bundles including the fresh items.

Ours is run from a community centre. I don't know how well it does, but I know about it because I drop food off at the food bank there (they do both).

I wouldn’t use something like this

We have one but we don’t charge people to use it!

Do you have a local foodbank? Could you collaborate with them at all?

Or contact some other Community Pantries/Larders to see how they manage?

I think they’re a great idea. I think you’re right that being able to offer fresh produce would be a bonus, rather than just tins and packets.

Also cleaning/personal care products are appreciated.

I know of 2, but neither charges.

1 is run from a library, has a fridge, freezer & outdoor storage space all set up there. Food is collected from local supermarkets & other shops eg local bakers by volunteers and then the community fridge opens at specific times (tying in with regular collections). Anyone can just turn up & take whatever they need / is available.

The other is at a school and again, produce is collected by volunteer school staff then left out for people to collect during school opening hours. This is mainly used by school families but also others in the local community. Everything is free though.

But this is the sort of thing we have in our community fridge

Photos didn’t add for some reason

I’d have to be able to specify no gluten to be able to use it or it would make me very ill. For that reason I couldn’t use any of the box schemes during lockdown even though I was on the CEV list. Food banks do cater for this, however.
A lot of people cannot eat either dairy or gluten or nuts so I think you’d have to be at least aware - or you leave out a huge section of society who are often in the most need.

I thought a community pantry was when people donated stuff they didn't need and other people could have it for free? There's one in a town close to us but I've never used it.

My understanding is community pantries / fridges are far more about reducing food waste than targeting specific areas of need like a food bank does. Of course they can help enormously for those with limited means but they are accessible & open to all in the community.

I would only use it if it was pitched as avoiding food waste - if you pitch it as cheap food for those in need you are unlikely to have enough customers as pride/oh they don't mean me, its for other people will stop a lot of customers coming.

To hit that market (ie people who want to avoid food waste and people who need cheap food) I think you do need fridges. Is there a church hall that also has storage rooms not currently in use?

@SushiGo

I would only use it if it was pitched as avoiding food waste - if you pitch it as cheap food for those in need you are unlikely to have enough customers as pride/oh they don't mean me, its for other people will stop a lot of customers coming.

To hit that market (ie people who want to avoid food waste and people who need cheap food) I think you do need fridges. Is there a church hall that also has storage rooms not currently in use?

This

@SushiGo

I would only use it if it was pitched as avoiding food waste - if you pitch it as cheap food for those in need you are unlikely to have enough customers as pride/oh they don't mean me, its for other people will stop a lot of customers coming.

To hit that market (ie people who want to avoid food waste and people who need cheap food) I think you do need fridges. Is there a church hall that also has storage rooms not currently in use?

This. For most, it won't be about pride. It will be the belief that those who have the means to feed themselves shouldn't take food from the mouths of those who don't just because they're technically eligible for a program that made a strategic choice not to means-test because doing so would impede access for the most needy. If this is truly intended for all income levels, that needs to be spelled out in the clearest possible terms on all marketing materials.

We run a community mini-market at our church which sounds like a very similar set up, we charge £1 for 10 items. The food comes from different sources - the local Tesco gives us all their bread (the baked in-store stuff) at the end of the previous day and there is a local charity that collects unwanted food from supermarkets, wholesale markets and manufacturers which we pay a set fee for so many boxes. We only run it once a week and the fresh food is delivered on the morning, so if we have things like milk, we don't refrigerate as it will be "sold" in a couple of hours.boxes
We run this alongside a "cafe" where we serve tea, coffee, soup, bread and we also have advice workers present.

@NannyR that sounds like a great idea. I wish all food banks could have advice workers, especially those with benefits and debt expertise. Even when I worked in social housing some years ago, it was obvious that was where help was needed. Two similar households, on the same incomes, one would manage reasonably well, the other would be sinking due to payday loans, purchases on high interest store cards etc.

What is it for?

If it's for those in need I wouldn't use it, I'm not in need. For those in need, paying £5 for "random" groceries that someone else didn't want might not actually be good use of that £5?

If it's about avoiding food waste you wouldn't have dried/tinned goods?

I think first you need to be clear on it's aims.

@ProfSprout

I know of 2, but neither charges.

1 is run from a library, has a fridge, freezer & outdoor storage space all set up there. Food is collected from local supermarkets & other shops eg local bakers by volunteers and then the community fridge opens at specific times (tying in with regular collections). Anyone can just turn up & take whatever they need / is available.

The other is at a school and again, produce is collected by volunteer school staff then left out for people to collect during school opening hours. This is mainly used by school families but also others in the local community. Everything is free though.

This sounds like a brilliant scheme.

I get what a Community Pantry is but where will your food be coming from? All the ones I can see online that charge a fee are focussed on access to fresh, healthy food that would otherwise be unaffordable and are supported by donations and grant funding. Do you have that in place? If you are only offering tins then won’t the food bank be a more attractive option since it’s free?

Ours doesn't charge. It started as shelves on someones drive as a 'take what you need, give what you can', then became a converted horse box on the same principle but with donated food being saved from landfill for everyone as well as basics for those in need. Its now moved to a local church and is still open everyday, but now staffed by volunteers and still a dual focus on saving food from landfill and filling in the gaps for people. They can also do foodbank vouchers and signpost help. Its brilliant, and helps so many people but the saving food from landfill thing (and their emphasis that they want people to come and get food) really breaks any stigma

I run one of these. The way we work:

• dedicated venue (free in our case, from the council). Not essential but a massive help.
• Open once a week.
• We ask for a £2 contribution towards costs but it's entirely voluntary.
• The overwhelming majority of stock comes from supermarkets and bakeries where we collect their excess, but we also buy in bulk quantities of bananas, apples etc (we would anyway, because we also do conventional food parcels and have funding for this).
• We'd ideally like recipients to volunteer if they're able, but in practice it doesn't happen open.
• Fridges / freezers a big help for obvious reasons.
• The "saving from landfill" angle is a big draw, interestingly moreso when we're trying to fundraise than with the people we support. Though we're in a very deprived area, linked to lots of other orgs and we have a storefront, so easy for those who need us to find us.

@TheWayTheLightFalls

I run one of these. The way we work:

• dedicated venue (free in our case, from the council). Not essential but a massive help.
• Open once a week.
• We ask for a £2 contribution towards costs but it's entirely voluntary.
• The overwhelming majority of stock comes from supermarkets and bakeries where we collect their excess, but we also buy in bulk quantities of bananas, apples etc (we would anyway, because we also do conventional food parcels and have funding for this).
• We'd ideally like recipients to volunteer if they're able, but in practice it doesn't happen open.
• Fridges / freezers a big help for obvious reasons.
• The "saving from landfill" angle is a big draw, interestingly moreso when we're trying to fundraise than with the people we support. Though we're in a very deprived area, linked to lots of other orgs and we have a storefront, so easy for those who need us to find us.

What a great set up - is it an empty shop you're using? Wondering if the Council own it, or if they've had to make a deal with the landlord.

Ours is free. That is the whole point of it.

Once you ask to pay then it becomes a very different setup.
We have a community centre locally that does something like this and just ask for a voluntary donation.
I feel really awkward using it as on the surface we look like an affluent family so pride stops me from using it. I feel like it would be expected that we make a good contribution. But if I have to pay then I would rather pay a normal price and get the items I actually want from discount supermarkets. If it's free I would take anything and make use of it - and this would really help as we've had a huge income hit lately.
Pride makes me feel like I would have to pay - if I have to pay I'd rather get what I want not the leftovers that can't be sold or are out of date.
Hope that makes sense!

We have several near us in different villages ...all donated ..no charge for those getting the items...tbh I've never heard anyone charging. Paying £5 for £15 worth of food you not chosen so you might not like it and you limited money...ok if free but if £5 that's alot