Customers at the LLanrumney Hall pantry which opened last year
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New pantry to serve Trowbridge and Rumney residents

Food poverty service offers ‘dignity and choice’ for struggling families

A COMMUNITY service that allows members to shop for food at cheaper prices than supermarkets will be available to people in Trowbridge and Rumney within a month.

The Your Local Pantry branch will open in Trowbridge Community Centre in a few weeks, offering fresh food, tinned goods, and other household essentials for a weekly fee of £5.

It will be the second of its kind to appear in Cardiff East during the pandemic, after a pantry opened in Llanrumney Hall last year.

According to community coordinator Sam Holt, the Llanrumney branch became the fastest growing branch in the UK.

Sam Holt, who set up the Llanrumney branch last year, said it was the fastest growing in the UK.

The manager of Trowbridge branch said it would offer “power and choice” to members in a way which traditional food banks do not.

“Choice is power and if you take people’s choice and money away from them, they’re only left with what they’re given. There’s no dignity in that,” said Jude Thoburn-Price, manager of the Trowbridge pantry.

“Over the last 12 months people’s choice has been taken away from them. There’s a lot of people losing their jobs and hundreds of people are applying for one job. It becomes soul destroying.”

Ms Price said that for £5 a week, members could pick goods including meat, fresh fruit and vegetables worth £15 to £25.

The Trowbridge Community Centre currently delivers weekly food parcels to 50 families, a number which Ms Price said is “growing by the week”.

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“I’ve had a lot of comments about how it’s nice that something is finally happening for Trowbridge,” she continued. “They are building a lot of houses here but there are no youth services, doctors surgery or library – obviously they don’t think people in Trowbridge can read.

“We’ve got nothing – everything we had 30 years ago is gone.”

  • To become a member of the Trowbridge branch, visit the the Local Pantry website or get in touch with the Trowbridge Community Centre.