The Bread and Butter Thing

We tackle premiums that such families face everywhere and the in-built social inequalities that come with them. Our model is a combination of direct delivery and regional/national policy work, learning from communities and using that learning to improve the policy environment.

We address systemic failures affecting these communities: 1) reduction in community cohesion as society provides fewer reasons to come together 2) reduction in the availability of healthy food as the commercial sector withdraws 3) retreat to remote support increasing digital exclusion.

The BMJ and CPAG amongst others have shown that Covid disproportionately affected our communities. There is a policy focus on extreme hunger and poverty accounting for 4% of the UK. Yet there are 21% who are ‘just about managing’ and struggling to access a healthy diet. TBBT’s model uniquely addresses this population at scale.

We are an early adopter of the Food Ladder Strategy and use our experience as a trailblazer in this area to inform and complement national-level campaigns, whilst giving people a leg up onto the next rung.

From its set-up in 2016, TBBT has grown to serving 158 communities and over 10,000 families every week, with 1000 locally-based volunteers and over 120,000 members.