SHOPPERS in Spalding have been lending their support to a campaign to make Christmas extra special this year – and we’re asking you to join in too.
Items worth more than £240 were handed over to volunteers from Agape Care Foodbank on Saturday as they held a collection in the town’s Sainsbury’s store.
They’re collecting to help provide a festive feast to families and individuals in crisis as part of a Christmas appeal, which is running in partnership with the Spalding Guardian.
At the weekend, Sainsbury’s customers contributed 322 items to the charity after being handed copies of the foodbank’s Christmas and normal shopping wish lists at the door.
Project manager Paul Walker said: “I did not expect the community to embrace this appeal as much as they have. There’s been a fantastic response from everyone who really want to support people in the community.”
Mr Walker added: “We had one lady who came in to drop off a bag of shopping and then she came back later with another bag.
“She had cashed in her Nectar points for a bag of food for the foodbank. We had quite a few people volunteer to deliver parcels as well.”
Almost 40 partner agencies are nominating their most deserving clients to receive a special hamper, which will contain all the ingredients to make a Christmas dinner – something many would otherwise miss out on.
This could include victims of domestic abuse, those who have been made redundant, people facing delays in benefit payments or those struggling to make ends meet.
Produce World Marshalls are providing all of the seasonal vegetables and we’re appealing for a supplier to donate the meat.
For all the other treats, we’re asking readers to chip in and buy an item from the Christmas shopping list.
Items can be taken to one of four drop off points; at the Lincolnshire Free Press and Spalding Guardian offices in The Crescent, Spalding, the Lighthouse Church in Haverfield Road, Spalding, Sainsbury’s in Holland Market, Spalding, or Market House in Market Street, Long Sutton.
Items must be donated by midday on Friday, December 16, ready for the parcels to be put together and distributed the week before Christmas.