Dear trustees, volunteers and supporters,

2025 has been a remarkable year of service for Gratitude Charity. On many fronts, we increased our giving to service users beyond expectations. New projects came on board. At the same time, our ongoing support for other charities and organisations continued to thrive.

Gratitude Groceries Giveaway (GGG)

GGG moved from 3 days a week to 7 days a week serving the public. Also, a welcoming addition of vegetarian hot meals being served along with the groceries. An estimate of 3000 people been supported a week. On average, we save around 30 tons of perfectly good food from waste each week. This contributes positively to the wellbeing of our local community and environment.

Gratitude Kids Corner (GKC)

GKC moved from a twice a week walk-in service to service by email requests. That way, we are managing to reach more families in need of our help then ever before. On average, we support around 100 families each month, alongside providing emergency packs ranging from baby essentials to school supplies. We also support nurseries and hospitals. Demand for this service continues to grow.
Ahead of the start of the school year, we provided local families with school uniforms and stationery through a dedicated giveaway.

Gratitude Charity Upcycle

Following up from the successful upcycle shop in Barnet, we started a shop in Pinner. The aim of the shops is to save furniture from waste. At the same time, they help fund the ever-increasing Gratitude services for the public.

DofE Awards Volunteering

The young volunteers were on a steady pace this year of keeping up the average of 30 teams per school term. Some are helping with our chores in Gratitude Hub and some are helping with our upcycle shops.

Corporate Volunteering

We had a great year of groups from various companies spending a day volunteering at Gratitude. Some companies sent different groups at different times throughout the year. Each group enjoyed the experience while engaging in a range of meaningful activities.

Schools Volunteering

We have 3 groups that are visiting the Hub during the week (can’t be named from security reasons). They channel their energy in positive ways to help our various projects. One of the projects that they are helping with is to put together foodbags for distribution to families of local schools.

Foodbags for Local Schools

A pilot test that became an on going project is to distribute to families of kids on the free school meals foodbags with extra groceries for the weekend.
We are looking for more local schools to have on board in the coming year.

Probation Services

Young adults are being accompanied by their probation officers to volunteer at Gratitude Charity. We are welcoming this scheme for several years now and seem to be working well for everyone.

Bulb Planting in the Borough

The past year has a great record for Gratitude’s bulb planting around the borough. We took part in planting bulbs in Mitzvah Day with the Mayor of Borehamwood and with Ukrainian ex-refugees who wanted to give back to the community.

Events for the local Community

At Gratitude charity we put together free annual events for the local community plus we are taking part in some.
This year, we organised an Easter event at the local Baptist Church. We also took part in an Eid event in Maxwell Park and joined the Armistice parade and wreath laying.

Later in the year, we arranged a Halloween event at Jump In Trampoline Park, participated in the Christmas market at Imperial Place, hosted a grand Christmas Grotto at SKY Studios, and organised a “bake-a-thon” of mince pies for people experiencing homelessness.

Giving out in Hospitals

Gratitude Creative Club distributed many knitted items such as baby blankets, premature baby hats, knitted toys and many more estimated as 1500 in total.
We also supported the antenatal department with donations of baby essentials plus baby clothes.
For Christmas we gave away many new toys to the inpatients and outpatients kids.

On Jewish holidays such as Rosh Hashana, Passover and Hanuka we gave away holidays gift packs to hospital patients who couldn’t celebrate at home. Many wrote us very heartfelt and thankful messages.

Support to a Women Refugees Centre

We are given food, kids essential and clothes collected by their support worker.

Humanitarian Aid to Ukraine

This year we are partnering with ‘Driving Aid to Ukraine’. Gratitude volunteers collected for them disability aids, pack together kids and adult’s clothes, games, travel cots and cleaning products. These are lifeline for people in hardships over there.

Acknowledgments:

We couldn’t do all the above without the super kind help of many supporters and volunteers.

We would like to thank the volunteers who serve in shifts at the Groceries Giveaway rota over the 7 days a week.
Our sincere thanks go to the volunteers who collect daily from shops, drive vans to dispose of waste, gather donations, and transport pallets of groceries and cleaning products.

We also thank the Gratitude Hub volunteers, who receive, sort, and process donations with the same dedication and care.

Equal appreciation goes to those serving in Kids Corner and the Community Kitchen. We also thank the volunteers supporting administration, communications, event presentations, shops, and fundraising. Our gratitude extends equally to everyone who helps clean, repair, and maintain our facilities and vehicles.
It takes a village to serve a village!

And for supporters, we couldn’t thank you enough!

This year you were outstanding!
You supported us through donations of funds, toys, and groceries. You also gave your time, advice, and professional skills. Again and again, you stepped in when help was needed, and we are deeply grateful.

With thanks: Gratitude Charity leaders

Photos by volunteers.