COVID-19 - Mustard Tree Overview
Our charity has been combatting poverty and trying to prevent homelessness for 25 years across Greater Manchester.
We support people who may be vulnerable, isolated and in need of financial support including pensioners, refugees, local residents as well as people who are living in hostels and some people living on the streets. We have a duty of care to our staff members, volunteers and also the people we support.
Our priority is to safely remain open to support those people in need through our shops (10am-2pm) and through our delivery service– within public health guidelines.
We are key workers under the Government definition of ‘Services providing food or drink to the homeless…Supermarkets and other food shops…Charities for the purpose of hosting essential voluntary or public services, such as food banks, homeless services’.
We will also proactively confront stigma or blame associated with any particular client group and maintain a factual resource for people.
We have 15 people currently based at our Ancoats Warehouse (110, Oldham Road, Manchester) and in our Little Hulton and Eccles sites.
We have 4 x vans and drivers who are DBS checked, trained in Incident Management, Safeguarding, Professional Boundaries and Food Hygiene.
We have community shops that we are using for the Food banks including a large warehouse in our Ancoats site with cold storage and a professional kitchen.
We have a retail distribution computer programme (Kudos) that schedules deliveries across North Manchester, South Manchester and Salford.
This system also allows us to record payments by individual clients if applicable as well as assigns credit for people who have no funds to we can monitor the individual customer records. Our standard charge for Mustard Tree clients on benefits is £2.50 for 10 items that they choose in the food club. We also provide free food dependant on circumstances. Our delivery model and any charges will be dependent on the agreement with each partner.
We have a Chef and Food Manager and our people are trained in Food Hygiene Level 2. We pick and pack goods for deliveries using PPE equipment and allow people who visit the shop to choose their items that we then pick off the shelves wearing PPE to avoid cross contamination. We check he hygiene of the Food club and packing areas on an ongoing basis and audit this twice daily and provide deep cleans once a day.
We have a website and helpdesk function that has at least 2 people available to take orders and process enquires including a team of volunteers working at home and helping with back office functions.
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