Food Stop

We believe that everybody should thrive and enjoy a full life but for many people in our community, this is not the case!

What is the Food Stop?

We believe that everybody should thrive and enjoy a full life but for many people in our community, this is not the case! Too many people in our community continue to struggle to even put food on the table for themselves and their family due to being on benefits, low wages and high rents, illness and disabilities… the list goes on. The current economic crisis and cost of living rises have made things even harder for people already finding things hard. This is why we have partnered with Croydon Council and the food charity Fare Share to support our community in this time of difficulty and crisis.

The Old Lodge Lane Baptist Church Food Stop is a community-led, multi-agency model that seeks to help people in our community to become more financially stable by providing a range of practical support and advocacy through partners and our own ‘in house’ support team. Each week we offer those that come the opportunity to reduce their food shopping bills by inviting them to pay £3.50 a week for around £15-£20 worth of fresh, chilled, frozen and tinned grocery shopping at our purpose built ‘social supermarket’ space each Friday morning (9am-12pm). This helps regular users of the shop save an average of £500-£700 per year.

A big proportion of our food is at, or close to its Best Before Date, so cannot be sold at Supermarkets but is still perfectly good to eat. This has resulted in over 30 tons of perfectly edible food being saved from landfill and given out to people in our community in the last year alone!

How can I get help?

Anyone can access the Food Stop. We don’t ask for any proof of benefits etc. All we ask is that people are in genuine need and willing to turn up on a Friday morning, pay £3.50 and do their shop in our shop space. We do collect minimal personal details the first time you come to us but this is never passed on to anyone else without your consent or knowledge.

We are open on Friday Mornings at 9am-12pm

If you are a professional wishing to make a referral or want to find out some more information, please drop us a quick email so that we can keep an eye out for the family or individual you are referring. Our email address is foodstop@ollbc.org.uk

How can I support this?

As you can well imagine, running something like this needs 3 things – food, money and volunteers. We are always in need of all 3!

This year we have seen a sharp rise in people accessing this service but also a reduction in food donations which means that we are having to find a bigger team and spend an additional £1000 a month to buy food in to distribute.

Any help from our ever generous community is always warmly welcomed.

If you want to find out how to make a financial or food donation or perhaps enquire about volunteering opportunities then please email us (foodstop@ollbc.org.uk) to find out more information.