Cambscuisine Community Fund
Our Community Fund
In September 2018 we launched the Cambscuisine Community Fund (CCF). Across all of our restaurants we've been raising money to support vulnerable people in Cambridgeshire. For every bill over £30, in all of our restaurants, we've been adding a discretionary £1 to support the Fund. We have raised over £185,000 for local charities some of whom we work with outside of this fund.
Thank you to our loyal local customers for their continued support with CCF. Please click here to see a video explaining what we are doing and why! Video is a little out of date…we no longer have Smokeworks or St.John’s Chop House but the sentiment is the same!
Most recently (June 2023) we’ve awarded the following:
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£10,335 to continue to provide the Outreach Employment Advice Service (2 days a week) for people who are homeless or vulnerably housed in Cambridge
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Trust received £5,000 to deliver an online course called “Resilience, Recovery, Relief” aimed at 35 looked after children in Cambridgeshire
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Received £5,000 towards an Employment, Training and Volunteering Programme to help 150 homeless people overcome challenges they face by increasing their confidence and self-esteem, learning new skills, gaining qualifications, undertaking work experience and helping them into secure paid employment
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Received £2,000 to deliver creative workshops and outdoor forest school sessions to support 76 local people with learning disabilities
Other beneficiaries
have included…
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received £4,000 towards covering one youth worker for 5 months as part of a youth work programme that reaches 350 LGBTQ+ children and young people.
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received £3,499 towards an increase in psychologist’s hours to meet the demand for supporting 15 children with sight loss.
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received £5,000 to support families affected by cancer by providing experiences such as cottage holidays, restaurants meals or spa breaks designed to make facing cancer more bearable.
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received £1,500 towards a weekly under-5s support group for mothers and children from socially deprived areas of Cambridge.
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received £5,000 towards core services for children at Milton hospice, including end of life care, short breaks, symptom management nursing, wellbeing activities, therapies, counselling, specialist play, spiritual support, and volunteer services in the home.
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received £1,500 towards home-visiting support for vulnerable South Cambridgeshire families who are at risk of slipping into crisis.
Our round before last:
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were awarded £15,641 to run an Outreach Employment Advice Service for people who are homeless or vulnerably housed in Cambridge to enable them to move on with their lives.
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were awarded £5,132 to provide specific employment training and emotional support to young women facing disadvantage, many of whom are at risk of homelessness and living in supported housing.
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were awarded £2,240 to provide weekly counselling sessions for vulnerable and financially disadvantaged men to improve mental well-being.
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were awarded £3,000 to run the Meaningful Activities project to empower homeless or vulnerably housed people to undertake training and work experience to learn new skills, earn qualifications and ultimately move into, or towards, employment.
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were awarded £3,300 to support homeless people into work by providing IDs, bus passes or bikes, and a one-off cost of living allowance once they’re employed.
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Food Alliance were awarded £3,928 towards the continued operation of the Cambridge food redistribution hub at Buchan Street Neighbourhood Centre during 2021/22, and/or enabling senior staff to work on establishing a permanent home for the hub.
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were awarded £2,000 to cover costs of the hub which provides community support, partner drop-ins, food provision and poverty alleviation services for 500 residents in the Abbey/Barnwell area of Cambridge (whilst the Community Centre is being rebuilt).
Case Study from CHS
Polly Thurston, Homelessness Projects Coordinator at Cambridge Housing Society:
Polly has delivered a project supporting those affected by homelessness into employment, volunteering and education. Polly says “With the grants from the Cambscuisine Community Fund to support our project since April 2020, we have been able to support 28 people in Cambridge City affected by homelessness, of these 8 have found employment opportunities, 11 have returned to education and 9 have started volunteering in the community. This wouldn’t have been possible without the support from the Cambscuisine fund”
Giving Time along the CCF
As a local restaurant group, community is at the heart of what we do.
Here are a few examples of how we try to get involved
– Each restaurant team is given two charity days each year for volunteers to spend time helping a charity of their choice.
– Staff at The Tickell Arms have lead baking classes for the children at William Westley school.
– Across our restaurants we hold regular charity coffee mornings and pub quizzes raising hundreds of pounds for charities such as Macmillan, The Children’s Society, Alzheimer’s Research UK as well as local community clubs and groups. Staff frequently bake cakes to bring to these events in their own time.