Are you looking for volunteering opportunities for your staff or colleagues? Talk to us about volunteering with FareShare South West!
FareShare South West can offer a unique team volunteering experience. Volunteering at one of the FareShare South West warehouses is fun, physical and provides an insight into the world of food surplus and food poverty in the South West. Corporate volunteering is a brilliant way to show your company’s commitment to the charity sector and build team morale.
Corporate volunteer days- at a glance:
- Capacity per day for maximum 5 people (half day volunteering, 1pm-5pm) or 8 people (full day volunteering, 9am-4pm)
- Full briefing, equipment, refreshments and training provided
- A chance to step inside the world of surplus food, and help us tackle food waste and hunger in the South West
- Priority is given to corporate teams who have a wider fundraising partnership with us. While a donation is not essential for one-off corporate volunteers who are not in partnership with us, we do ask you to consider if there are ways of supporting financially alongside giving your time. This helps us cover our costs of setting up your volunteering day, and goes directly to supporting food redistribution to those in need.
Corporate volunteer day FAQs
What will we do?
At the beginning of your time with us, we’ll give you a tour of our warehouse, introduce you to the staff and volunteers and answer any questions around what we do. You’ll then receive a full Health and Safety Induction, including Basic Principles of Fire Safety, Food Hygiene, and Manual Handling, followed by provision of PPE for the day.
Your team will then get involved at the heart of FareShare South West’s food re-distribution, giving you the opportunity to help us improve the daily lives of people facing food poverty. Our daily operations rely on our brilliant volunteers, and you will be working alongside staff and other volunteers in a range of activities, that might include but are not limited to:
- Assisting our drivers to deliver food to Community Members across Bristol and the region (full day volunteers only)
- Helping collect food from donors
- Picking food for our members’ orders
- Sorting food and organising our warehouse
- Cleaning and tidying
Please bear in mind that many of these activities are physical and may involve some lifting, carrying and bending. However, the last thing we want is to put barriers in the way of anyone who wants to assist us. Please do let us know if any of your team have any issues that might impact their time with us, and we will do our utmost to adjust our practices to suit them.
Clothing
- Please wear clean, casual clothes that are suitable for manual work. It can be chilly in the depot in winter and warm in summer so we suggest that you wear layers.
- Jewellery should be limited to stud earrings and simple rings. Watches and bracelets should also not be worn while in the warehouse
- We do have lockers, but they are limited and on a first-come basis. As such we recommend leaving valuable or fragile items at home.
- Please wear sensible, sturdy shoes or boots. If you have your own safety boots, you are very welcome to wear them.
Health & Safety
You will be provided with a Health and Safety induction at the beginning of the day, and all necessary Personal Protective Equipment will be provided- if members of your team have their own steel toe-capped safety shoes, they are more than welcome to bring them along, but if not we recommend any flat-souled shoes other than pumps, and we can then provide steel-toecapped overshoes.
Refreshments
Tea, coffee and water are freely available at the depot. Our volunteers all have lunch provided, however we do recommend you bring a packed lunch and/or some cash if you have special dietary requirements that we are unable to meet on the day.
Feedback
We hope that your day at FareShare really brings our work to fight hunger and food waste to life. Please let us know what you think by completing a feedback form at the end of the day so that we can continue to improve these opportunities for all our volunteers.
Taking photos
We encourage people to take photos of their team on the day. Prior permission will be needed before photos are taken of FareShare South West volunteers, staff and our Community Food Members. We will provide a consent form upon request.
If posting on social media, please remember to tag us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin
Logistics
- Please email us the full names of all team members at least 3 weeks in advance (where possible!) and keep us updated with any changes in staff.
- Please take our contact details in case anyone has trouble finding us or is running late on the day.
- These days are designed for our corporate supporters and not family members.
- Last minute cancellations have a genuine impact on our ability to deliver our mission on the day, however we completely understand that unforeseen circumstances can take precedence. All we ask is that you let us know with as much notice as possible if people cannot make it on the day, so we know not to expect them.
- If a member of your team is ill, we would much rather they stayed home rather than struggling in- they won’t enjoy the experience with us, and also from a food hygiene perspective we’d rather keep cross-contamination of germs to an absolute minimum! This is particularly true with any illness resulting in symptoms of nausea and/or diarrhoea. Even if someone is feeling better, they should still be clear of any symptoms for 48 hours before coming to the warehouse to minimise the risk of cross-contamination.
Get in touch
For more information, please email corporatevolunteers@faresharesouthwest.org.uk
Our location
FareShare South West
Unit 4
Little Ann Street
St Judes
Bristol BS2 9EB
Nearest Rail Station: Lawrence Hill
