Ten years, 70 million meals and one very special celebration

Ten Years at a Glance

Over the last decade, The Bread and Butter Thing has grown from a practical local response into the UK's largest B2C, member based food charity. By connecting surplus food directly with households through trusted weekly food clubs, we turn redistribution into regular access, local connection and practical support for communities.

Our ten year report delves deep into The Bread and Butter Things' 10 years of doing things differently, starting with the idea of unlocking more good food, reaching people directly and creating greater impact in communities, to the proven and scalable form of prevention infrastructure it is today. A model that works across supply chains, communities and public systems, reducing pressure before it becomes crisis.

You can read our full 10 year report, and find out more about our proven model which delivers measurable value for people, communities, and the wider system.

HAF Around the Hub: A summer of food, fun and family support

This summer, our HAF Around the Hub programme reached thousands of children and families across England, helping make the school holidays healthier, happier and a little easier.

What is HAF?

HAF stands for Holiday Activities and Food. It is a government-funded programme delivered through local authorities, providing children from low-income families with free holiday activities, nutritious food and safe, enriching places to spend time during the school holidays.

Our HAF Around the Hub model builds on this by using TBBT’s existing network of community food clubs to connect holiday provision with the families and communities we already work alongside.

During 2026, we worked across 67 communities, with 96 activity providers and 18 councils, helping to create:

• 10,806 activity spaces

• 12,545 Bread and Butter vouchers

• 398,950 meals

By working through established community networks, HAF Around the Hub helps tackle some of the practical barriers that can prevent families taking part, while providing additional food support at a time when household budgets can be particularly stretched.

But the impact went far beyond the numbers.

For local organisations, the Bread and Butter vouchers also created opportunities to start conversations with families who might otherwise be difficult to reach.

As Karbon Homes told us:

“The Bread & Butter vouchers have been a really valuable engagement tool. While handing them out at one of today's sessions, I had some really meaningful conversations with families that may not otherwise have taken place.”

Those conversations opened the door to discussions about the cost of living and other challenges families were experiencing, allowing people to be connected with further support when they needed it.

For parents, the programme provided something equally practical: somewhere safe and positive for children to spend their holidays, while easing some of the pressure of childcare and food costs.

One parent in Warrington told us:

“The camp was fantastic. Not only did my son get to do lots of sports and activities that he wouldn't usually have the opportunity to try, but it meant I could continue working and not have to use holidays or take unpaid leave.”

Another parent in Manchester described how her daughter spent the summer trying new sports, making friends and coming home excited to talk about her day, rather than spending weeks at home after her usual childcare arrangements fell through.

And in Kirklees, one parent summed it up simply:

“It’s been great to have a safe place for my kids over the summer. They have loved the sessions, been kept busy as well as eating a healthy meal each day.”

Making holiday support easier to access

We are really proud to play a part in making HAF work for more families. School holidays can bring additional pressure for parents, as childcare costs rise, food bills increase and normal routines disappear. By connecting activity, food and wider support through one familiar community route, we make it easier for families to access the help available without having to navigate multiple systems or work out where to go next. High-quality holiday provision can ease some of that pressure while giving children the chance to eat well, stay active, try new things and spend time with friends.

This work is made possible through close collaboration with councils, community organisations and activity providers, alongside the support of Sainsbury’s and Comic Relief, whose backing helps us extend the reach and impact of HAF Around the Hub.

For us, HAF Around the Hub is about more than filling holiday spaces. It is about making sure families can access the right support, in the right place, without unnecessary barriers.

A Decade of Affordable Food

We’re marking 10 years of The Bread And Butter Thing with a proper origin story on our award winning podcast, A Slice of Bread and Butter. Our founders, Mark and Jane, joined us to talk about the early gamble of setting up an affordable food club: cutting costs, losing a salary, and giving the idea just long enough to prove it could stand on its own feet. Listen as they discuss uncomfortable money truths, and the moments that turned a local experiment into a national food network that now supports over 120,000 households.

Grab yourself a cuppa, sit back and listen to the amazing story behind TBBT.

Barfoots and The Bread and Butter Thing partnership saves over 100 tonnes of surplus produce from waste

Barfoots and The Bread and Butter Thing (TBBT) have joined forces to create a simple and scalable approach to surplus food redistribution, diverting almost 100 tonnes of edible fresh produce from anaerobic digestion and disposal into human consumption.

The partnership began with a simple idea: rather than changing how food is produced, change where surplus food goes.

In less than two months, the partnership has already redistributed over 100,000kg of surplus produce (the equivalent of 238,100 meals!) to communities through TBBT’s network.

Crucially, the model has been designed to fit seamlessly into Barfoots’ existing production processes, meaning the redistribution comes at zero operational cost to the producer, with no additional transport emissions.

Barfoots’ existing production lines already had segregation points where produce could be separated. By creating a clearly defined surplus stream for TBBT, edible food that would otherwise have left the human food chain could instead be rapidly redistributed to communities in the Bread and Butter food club network.

This produce includes Tenderstem broccoli leaves, stems and floret pieces, sweet potatoes, asparagus affected by size or appearance specifications, as well as chillies and green beans that did not meet colour or size specifications.

Steve Brown, Head of Customer Technical at Barfoots, said:

“The difference between putting something in this bin or this bin is literally zero.”

The partnership removes many of the traditional barriers that can make surplus redistribution difficult. Donated and reusable trays help overcome packaging costs, existing segregation requires no additional shop-floor labour, and TBBT uses Fowler Welch backhaul transport, meaning no additional vehicles are required and there are no added transport emissions.

Aldi played an important role in bringing Barfoots and TBBT together, helping to connect the commercial and community objectives of the partnership.

TBBT provides the flexibility and infrastructure needed to respond quickly to variable volumes and specifications, with the ability to collect produce the following day through existing transport routes and distribute it to communities experiencing food insecurity.

The results demonstrate how food waste reduction can be built into existing supply chains without creating additional complexity.

The impact so far

• 48,195kg of surplus food redistributed

• 114,752 meals delivered to communities

• Food diverted from lower-value waste routes into human consumption

• Zero financial cost to Barfoots’ operations

• No additional transport emissions

• Multiple product streams moved rapidly from trial to full rollout

This partnership also demonstrates the potential for closer collaboration between food producers, retailers and food redistribution organisations to deliver both environmental and social benefits.

The model is designed to be scalable and replicable, showing that surplus food redistribution does not necessarily require new infrastructure, additional labour or complicated processes.

As Steve Brown puts it:

“For redistribution to work, it must be no more complicated than a spoon.  With this principal in mind, we have worked with The Bread and Butter Thing to identify easy to collect waste streams that add negligible disruption to day-to-day operations, ensuring it becomes business as usual”

Justin Pritchard, Head of Food at The Bread and Butter Thing, said:

“The important thing is that it has been made simple. We’re not asking producers to create a whole new process or take on additional cost. We’re finding ways to make redistribution part of what they already do.”

The partnership shows that food waste reduction at scale can be achieved by making redistribution a simple part of existing supply chains – turning surplus produce that would otherwise be wasted into nutritious food for communities.

160 parties in 6 days!

As you may have guessed from our other stories, The Bread and Butter Thing is 10, and we’ve been celebrating this milestone in style across all our hubs during the week of 7 to 12 September. 

With thanks to our generous partners at Sainsbury's, Iceland and Westmill, all of our individual food clubs received party packs, cordial and cake on their service day to help celebrate and mark this very special occasion.

Members joined in with decorations, fancy dress, awards ceremonies, and one hub even presented us with a Bread and Butter blue heart balloon (which is currently bobbing about in TBBT Breadquarters)! These wonderful celebrations are continuing throughout September, so be sure to follow us on Instagram and like all our posts celebrating our amazing members, volunteers and suppliers who make Bread and Butter such a special place.

Volunteer with us this Christmas!

Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year for TBBT, and we need your help.

Every week, around 10,000 families rely on us. We never want to miss a delivery, even over Christmas, so when our usual hub days fall over the festive break, we move them to make sure members still get their food.

That means a lot of extra activity in a very short space of time, and we need more hands on deck to make it all happen.

If you can spare a few hours over the festive season, you could help us pack food, support a hub, or keep things moving behind the scenes.

Give us a few hours and help make sure 10,000 families a week can still count on TBBT this Christmas.

Join Team TBBT this Christmas and find out more about what you could be getting up to on the day by emailing: corporatevolunteering@breadandbutterthing.org