Lidl donates more than 50,000 meals to Shropshire charities and has further plans

Lidl GB’s food surplus data, combined with an averaged survey result of Lidl GB’s customer food donation point, revealed an estimated 53,741 meals were donated, contributing to a total of over six million meals donated across the country last year.

Lidl continuously donates meals to local communities through stores and warehouse surplus, and valued customer donations.

Since introducing its Good to Give trustmark - an industry first initiative to help diversify and increase food bank donations – seven months ago, Lidl has seen in-store customer food donations for local charities increase by an estimated 25 per cent. This is the equivalent of over 250,000 additional meals between June and December 2022.

Following new research revealing that 72 per cent of local charities need more toiletries to support communities through the cost of living crisis, Lidl now also plans to expand Good to Give to 10 hygiene products.

Shoppers will be able to spot the Good to Give trustmark on price tickets for 10 essential sanitary and personal care items, including tampons, toothpaste and nappies, from 16th March. These can be dropped at existing donation points located past the checkouts in all Lidl GB stores and will be collected by charity volunteers who already come to pick up food donations weekly.

Mark Newbold, Senior CSR Manager at Lidl GB, said: “With the cost of living crisis continuing to put pressure on local communities, we want to go beyond our commitment to making good food accessible to everyone by looking at other support we can provide.

“Hygiene poverty is the daily reality for over 3.2 million adults across the country, and our charity partners working day in day out with those in need have told us that the problem is only growing.

"We hope that by providing grants and encouraging our customers to once again donate a little differently, we can get more local charities more of these basic yet vital products.”

Lidl is also providing £50,000 worth of grants for local organisations working to tackle hygiene poverty in their communities, within its network, coordinated by Neighbourly.