FareShare and Tesco were celebrated at this year’s Third Sector Charity Business Awards with the top prize in the Long Term Partnership category.
The two organisations have worked together since 2012 to help alleviate poverty in the UK by ensuring surplus food within the Tesco supply chain is used to feed people and doesn’t end up as waste.
Over the last ten years, Tesco has provided food to FareShare via its distribution centres and back of store surplus, as well as funding, support from its suppliers, enabled in store and online customer donations and continues to find new ways it can support the charity.
Tesco is by far FareShare’s biggest partner and, since the partnership began, Tesco and its customers have provided food and funding equivalent to 200 million meals for vulnerable people across the country. In the last calendar year alone, customers donated 1,464 tonnes via the Tesco Food Collection and donation points, which is equivalent to almost 3.5 million meals.
In November 2022, to celebrate ten years of partnership, Tesco ran a donation only pop up shop in central London – The Give Back Express – where customers could donate to FareShare and the Trussell Trust while learning more about the work of both charities. This unique event raised £20,000 for the charities which will help to bolster the work they’re doing to support people through the cost of living crisis.
The partnership reaches much further than food. During the pandemic, Tesco reaffirmed its support of FareShare by launching a £12m package of support, enabling the charity to purchase the equivalent of more than 11m meals alongside setting up a temporary national distribution centre. In October 2022, Tesco announced a £1m cost of living support package to be split between FareShare and the Trussell Trust to help both organisations meet the exceptional challenges they are facing due to the crisis. This funding was used to help FareShare’s mission of doubling the amount of surplus food received over the next few years, helping the charity look at innovative ways to ensure they can accept more surplus food offers and extend the life of the food they receive.
Li Brookman, Senior Commercial Manager at FareShare, said: “We are delighted to have won this Third Sector Charity Business Award recognising our longstanding partnership with Tesco. Over the last ten years, FareShare and Tesco have achieved so much together through a variety of campaigns like the annual Food Collection to the FareShare Go programme which sees all Tesco stores providing their end of day surplus to charities and community groups.
“Our work with Tesco demonstrates how the retailer has taken a pragmatic and proactive approach to maximise surplus food distribution across their operation, creating a huge social benefit to communities across the UK. With so much of FareShare’s food coming from Tesco, the environmental and social impact that this partnership has had, and continues to have, is unrivalled.”
