Facilitated through the Heart of England Community Foundation, we received £100,000 from the Inclusive Communities Fund, a legacy of the Commonwealth Games, to support the renovations to the kitchen adjoining the upstairs hall at Saints Central as part of our Phase 2 renovations.

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The kitchen has now been refurbished to a commercial catering standard to provide refreshments / catering for events in the hall, provide an additional training venue for putting on food courses as well as enabling us to expand our programmes to support the local community. The income generated from our brand-new kitchen is vital in supporting the sustainability of our social enterprise in the heart of Nuneaton.

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At Saints, we are helping the region grow by improving places and spaces that matter to the community. Our project helps to support the re-imagining of our town centre, encouraging social activities, training, education and new start up business space within the town centre. Without a suitable kitchen space, our capacity for supporting our community would substantially reduce.

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Saints was also awarded £49.800 from the Social Impact Fund managed by Heart of England Community Foundation, which ran from April 2022 to March 2024. A key part of the project was giving food to hungry families. Starting with giving out food hampers, Saints switched to providing nutritious hot meals.

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The final quarter of the programme saw 1,207 participants developing skills or dropping into Saints, of these many were disaffected children, who had missed out on their schooling due to the COVID lockdown.

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Food & activities for young people ranged from a breakfast club, young mums & tots, art classes, lessons in cooking with a slow cooker, half-term activities, and then a contribution towards the surging energy costs at the end of the funding period. Whilst funding ended in March 2024, many of the young people continue to engage with Saints.