SINCE it opened, just over nine years ago, the Crediton Tesco Superstore has been serving the local community via its Community Champion position.
Whilst that will continue there is now a subtle change in emphasis and a major expansion of the role currently being trialled.
The first significant change is that John Smith has joined Andrew Drayton to “partner-up” to form a Combined Community Team that will not only serve the Crediton store but, now, the Exeter Vale Extra store as well.
Between them, Andrew and John will cover the hours allocated to each store for the Community Champion role, which has previously proved so successful in and around the Crediton Area.
Andrew explained the changes: “It will be great to now work officially with John, who has been helping me with the community work on an ad hoc basis over the past few years, whilst also doing his well-known ‘Front-of-Store’ job.
“We work very well together as a team and, like myself, John thoroughly enjoys the opportunities to get out and assist local groups, charities and organisations wherever we can.”
He continued: “Taking on the Exeter Vale role as well will provide us both with a challenge that we are very much looking forward to.
“The Exeter store’s community work is quite a bit different to the Crediton position in that it is much more centred around the immediate area, very close to the store, whereas, because of its more rural nature, the Crediton store catchment sees us go much further afield to try to meet the needs of the villages that surround us, in addition to the work that we do in the actual town.”
John tells us that this is a wonderful opportunity for him, especially as he is someone who supposedly “retired” in 2012, expecting to do a bit of “quiet gardening, singing and a little flying” with just a gentle hour or two each week at the front of store in Tesco and not a lot else!
He says that there is actually something strange about the retail business which “draws you in” and especially, in his own case, how all the store’s many community projects (of which Tesco is so rightly proud) has gradually offered him more and increasingly exciting things to become involved in.
“Happily, I don’t think I’ve retired at all,” says John!
Typical of this, for John, was his time spent managing the Tesco “Farm to Fork” project in the Crediton store area.
A very successful, four-year project which involved thousands of young children (from local schools, clubs and associations) helping them to find out where their food comes from, how we should all support our local growers and suppliers and a whole range of topics, tours and activities set around Healthy Eating, Meals on a Budget, Sugar Reduction, Sustainability and Waste Reduction.
John’s new role, working with Andrew, brings a lot of his previous work into sharp focus with a much broader base of community groups, schools and charities to work alongside.
“This is a challenge which was quite unexpected, but it is one that I am very proud and pleased to accept with alacrity,” John told us.
He continued: “I am particularly pleased to be developing closer contact with the Bags of Help initiative and the Community Food Connection project in both of our store communities. These are so worthwhile and important, both locally and nationally. It is a real pleasure to be a central part of it with Andrew.”
The Exeter store had been without a Community Champion for a while so Andrew and John helped there with a couple of projects during the Christmas period, which led to them being offered the joint role, starting at the end of January.
In this initial period, the pair are working together as John learns more about the role and as they meet the groups they will work with in the Exeter area.
Andrew sees this as a starting point with the two of them diversifying more and more as the roles require, develop and become busier, stating: “This time of year is normally quite quiet from a community point of view, so we are spending this time by getting John up to speed with the technicalities and administration that the role requires and also ‘getting our faces known’ in the immediate area of the Exeter store.
“This will allow us, as we move towards the busier periods of the year, to go our separate ways and be able to attend multiple events, even if they are on the same day.”
A CHANGE OF EMPHASIS
Along with the expansion changes, there are changes of emphasis for Community Champions up and down the country which are being embraced by all.
There will be more of a focus on the successful Tesco Bags of Help Scheme and the Community Food Connection Scheme.
The Bags of Help Scheme provides grants of either; £4,000, £2,000 and £1,000 to projects local to each store for a variety of projects.
Customers of the store will be familiar with the “blue tokens” which they use to vote for the three groups that make it to the store vote.
Since 2016 the Crediton store has seen 45 projects benefit from £151,000 worth of Bags of Help funding, part of the 2,486 and more than £7.5 million granted to projects throughout the South West region.
Andrew talked through how the change of emphasis will work: “We hope that, essentially, there will be no discernible difference in much of the community work that the store does. We will still be looking to help out at as many local events as we can - which is something else that Community Champions are being asked to do more of but we currently do to a high level anyway - the only real difference will be that the community budget will be less flexible for donations throughout the year and that will affect us in how many times we can provide a donation to a single group or organisation.”
He continued: “We hope very much that this won’t affect our community work too much as, even if we cannot provide a donation, we can still go to an event and help out and, in my experience, this is the side of the work that is appreciated even more.
“Having an extra pair of hands at a School Fete, for example, or the help that we provide to marshal events such as the Christmas in Crediton lights switch-on will continue.”
The other Tesco Scheme that has seen great success nationally is the Food Connection Scheme. All produce and items that are not sold by their “sell by date” are offered to local groups to collect from Tesco stores, free-of-charge, in the evening.
The Crediton store currently has collection days available and is looking to build a list of organisations that would be interested in “ad hoc” collections if current collectors can’t make their collection day/time.
The scheme benefits in two ways in that it provides free food to organisations that can use it for their own ends and it is drastically reducing food waste from the store which is recycled for fertiliser or energy production, with no items going to landfill.
To contact the new Community Champion Team please telephone Andrew on 07718 533015, John on 07933 670449 or email them at: [email protected] .
For information on the Bags of Help Scheme visit: www.groundwork.org.uk/sites/tescocommunityscheme .
For information on the Food Connection Scheme, visit: