Over 200 households receive Christmas Meals in a Bag

Families across Wythenshawe enjoyed a delicious Christmas treat this week, thanks to the generosity of local businesses, organisations and volunteers.

In its third year of running, our Christmas Meal in a Bag initiative saw 211 households receiving enough ingredients to cook up a meal to enjoy with their families on Christmas Day. Over 40 of our colleagues volunteered at Woodhouse Park Lifestyle Centre over the two days before Christmas to hand-pack the bags, before delivering them around the community.

Bags included a range of ingredients, from a frozen chicken to vegetables, stuffing and gravy. For residents who preferred an alternative, they received Christmas treat bags which included cheese, biscuits, mince pies and chocolate.

Colette Humphrey, Project Manager, coordinated the initiative and expressed her gratitude for the outcome of it all. “Helping out with this is one of my highlights of the year working here. I’ve been fortunate enough to have always taken for granted that I’ll have Christmas dinner, so I wanted to do what I could to ensure our community could too.

“Work started in October with contacting supermarkets and our local butchers to give them advance notice of our bulk order. Then, it was putting out pleas for colleagues to volunteer to help. We’ve made improvements each year to how it’s all organised, to make it as quick and easy as possible on the two days that we pack all the bags up and deliver them to where they’re needed.

“This year, we’ve given out more bags than ever before and we got through it all more quickly too!”

We want to give a massive thank you and well done to everyone involved, including our suppliers who have supported this project and contributed to our Social Value Fund. Special thanks to Tesco Wythenshawe, Jewson Partnership Solutions, Murray Building Services, and GMS Services Ltd.