Bakkavor colleagues from its UK sites not only celebrated GroceryAid Day on Thursday 9 May they also organised a Big Bakkavor Walk challenge to raise money for their chosen charity partner. GroceryAid offers a whole array of support services to people working in the grocery industry and their families – including counselling, legal advice and help with budgeting and financial grants.

Every year, Bakkavor runs initiatives to support GroceryAid, and this year the business decided to run a single, inclusive initiative that supported both GroceryAid Day (9 May) and Mental Health Awareness Week (13-19 May) with a theme of ‘movement’.

The Big Bakkavor Walk has been organised by Bakkavor’s Wellbeing Champions across its UK sites to promote the importance of movement and exercise on mental health and wellbeing, an issue Bakkavor supports throughout the year through a range of employee initiatives. Various activities to get moving have been planned from lunch-time walks to long treks. There was not only walking, but a number of other activities organised to promote ‘movement’ from hula-hooping to step and strength challenges.

Highlights from around the UK:

• Bakkavor Pizza in Holbeach, Lincolnshire – The site organised various activities including Hula-Hooping and Stepper challenges and a cake sale, raising in total £840 for Grocery Aid.
• Bakkavor Salads in Bourne, Lincolnshire – The site team organised a car wash for GroceryAid.
• Group Services in Spalding, Lincolnshire – organised GroceryAid bingo to raise awareness on the amazing free and confidential support that the Charity can provide to colleagues and their families.
• Bakkavor Meals in Abbeydale, London – They had a number of activities for colleagues to participate in, including a ‘Guess the number of Jellybeans in the Jar’, Grip Strength Competition to find out Abbeydale’s strongest colleague and a steps challenge.
• Bakkavor Salads in Bo’ness, Scotland – decided to spread kind words to all employees with motivational message cards as well as promoted GroceryAid Helpline for employee wellbeing to brighten up everyone’s day.
• Bakkavor graduates, apprentices and placement students teamed up to complete a 150 Mile Challenge. As part of the challenge, one group completed a 27-mile circuit of Rutland Water, and another completed 24 miles around Fort William and the Bidein Bad Circular in the Highlands of Scotland. So far, they’ve raised over £1,000 for GroceryAid.

Donna-Maria Lee, Chief People Officer at Bakkavor commented: “Throughout the year our passionate colleagues in each of our sites do remarkable things to support local causes and charities – everything ranging from food banks to children’s charities. For May, it is wonderful to have people from across our sites doing something together. Mental health is a big priority for our business and it’s also an issue GroceryAid does so much to support – so linking the two with our Big Walk made perfect sense.

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