Before the game against Grimsby on 22nd of November, the Trust held our second food bank collection event with the Swindon Food Collective, looking to make progress from our first attempt at the start of the season. The weather on the day obviously didn’t get the memo, with the volunteers battling the wind and rain for the duration. It couldn’t dampen our spirits however, as the generosity shown by both Swindon and Grimsby fans blew us away, far outstripping the amount we imagined we would be collecting.
Board members Andy Bennett and James Leggett were joined by Swindon Food Collective’s CEO Matt Jones and Strategy Manager Cher Smith MBE for the event. We were also very thankful to Trust member Paul Davis who volunteered his assistance (and I’m sure some of you can still hear his rallying cries ringing in your ears, eagerly collecting donations with SFC’s money bucket in hand!).
A big thank you goes out to Caroline, Sotiris and the other staff at the Club who worked to get the collection in place, and to our friends in the print and podcast media for helping to spread awareness of the event.
Although we were pleased at the time with how the first collection went and happy with the amount we collected at the start of the season, lessons we learnt and changes we made allowed us to improve our efforts on the day and thankfully the amount of donations reflected that.
Once again, a massive thank you to everyone that was able to give so generously, whether big or small. We collected an incredible 156.5kg of food worth an equivalent of £273.88, as well as £83.31 in donations. We in the Trust are simply blown away by everyone’s generosity, especially in the run up to Christmas and a week before payday, thank you all so much.