Published 2026-10-15

Status changed to
Project complete

It made it possible! The Grow Along with Us community growing project was entirely funded by the PB money. It enabled us to create an order form with various items that the participants could choose from, each person had a maximum points budget (much like our Village Larder system) that they could have for free fully funded by the PB. We encouraged people to order only what they needed as any money left over could benefit another person. We offered this scheme to only larder customers so we already knew that food growing costs may be something that prevented them from getting started. Several of the people participating were supported in previous years with items we bought in for supporting their gardening. We wanted to offer choice this time so that the GAWU followed the same model as our larder. This meant that they could decide on what they needed, what they wanted to grow etc. I have attached a sample of the order form to the supporting docs to show what was on offer. People generally chose a raised bed within their options, along with seeds and soil to support their food growing. 8 people participated in this part of the PB project. The remaining part of our award was absorbed in further food growing essentials for the community roots garden, the produce is shared amongst the garden volunteers and the Village Larder, however, we find that even the garden volunteers that we know are on lower incomes generally prefer to send the food up to the larder. This, I think, is because they thrive on the purpose that the food growing for the larder gives them. It gives them great joy to share what is produced. We think the GAWU model really worked well and the ordering from B&Q and Tradepoint made it easier on the administration side of it (opposed to the previous bulk buying of things and trying to distribute ourselves). Larger items like the raised beds were delivered directly to the customers from B&Q, as the forms were reviewed weekly we were able to put a weekly order in over the course of a few weeks which meant that compost, seeds and seed trays were delivered to us in smaller batches and meant that there was not a massive list of deliveries to organise in one go. We also received a return on the orders via Easy Fundraising and had a 5% discount on items that were available through Tradepoint. Another element of GAWU was that we produced a handout with how to grow sustainably and some methods that we use in the community garden such as no-dig, no pesticides etc. This is something that we are passionate about and it enabled us to educate gently on our preferred ways of gardening so that first time growers could learn with us so that their gardening habits form in a way that is better for the environment and for maximising production. We absolutely will roll this out again this year should we be successful again. It also served as a way to build more relationships with the larder customers so that we are joining up both our larder and garden projects. Several of the GAWU growers are on a Your Gardens chat and other parts of our community roots gardening whatsapp channel. This encourages sharing between the volunteers and growers and offers peer support and encouragement. The beautiful thing is that people who are on lower incomes and are larder customers are learning how to grow food themselves and it has been wonderful to see how much joy that has brought to them when they enthusiastically share pics of the dinner they have cooked with their own produce, harvesting pics and recently one person shared a photo of their 1st prize they got for their basket of produce at the Flower Show.