On 13th September, our team, supported by Business Fives will be getting together with other businesses across the city to compete in a game of football fives and raise money for Grocery Aid.

We are proud to support Grocery Aid and all of the important work that they do to provide those in our industry with vital help across multiple aspects and challenges they may face throughout their lives.

They offer Financial, Practical and Emotional support to colleagues working across the Food and Drink industry and an extract from their 2023/2024 impact report highlights just how important this work is...

"We are delighted to share GroceryAid’s Impact Report for 2023/24 which shows growing demand for our financial, emotional and practical support and highlights the impact we make to thousands of colleagues across the sector. In total we spent more than £6million supporting colleagues in 2023/24.

As well as providing more than 78,000 incidents of colleague support (a 93% increase on the previous year), the £6m spend included helping 5,926 children go back to school in September 2023 with the right equipment and clothing, through our School Essentials Grant.

Our free and confidential Helpline saw a 22% increase in calls from colleagues looking for emotional and practical support. Qualified counsellors provided 11% more in-the-moment counselling sessions than the previous year.

We also saw a 108% increase in colleagues accessing support for problem gambling, and over 1,500+ colleagues accessed online self-help and CBT guided sessions."

We are looking to raise as much money as we possibly can so that Grocery Aid can continue their mission. If you are able to, please click here to head to our Just Giving page and donate, every penny is appreciated!

Thank you to our players; Iain Shanley, Giuseppe Leo, Greg Carroll, Martin Bryce, Marc Kustra, Ben O'Shaughnessy and Sam Gilmour... keep an eye on our socials on 13th September to see how they perform!