“There is no power greater than a community discovering what it cares about.”
Margaret J Wheatley
Our vision
Our vision is to inspire and grow communities of Hope throughout Nottingham and beyond
Our mission
Hope Nottingham today continues the transformational pattern that emerged in its early years, which was coined the ‘G.R.A.C.E’ mission model by our founder, former Director and current Ambassador, Nigel Adams:
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'Hope Nottingham has the dynamic of a Christ-Centered approach uniting God’s people in Giving to provide Relief and Advice to those in need. This in turn creates Community and Empowers people to participate in Giving time and resources to help others, thus creating the positive cycle, of a growing, transformational community….. This kind of community has a quality of GRACE that brings life and enables creativity so that the community grows in number and in its ability to care for and love one another’
Our values
Our Core Values are rooted in our Christian culture and illustrate how we carry out our work
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Compassion - We are genuinely concerned about others and offer our time, kindness and friendship in safe spaces
Working Together - We are team driven to idetify and nurture partnerships with organisations of all denominations across Nottingham
Trust - We build relationships and earn trust through our integrity and are committed to keeping it
Belonging - Faith-focused, we welcome all and provide opportunities for comfort, connection and contribution.
Positive Change - We create new possibilities and embrace ideas, led from and by the community, to lift local people from crisis, restoring hope and transforming lives.
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Our Impact
READ OUR ANNUAL REPORT FOR
July 2022-June 2023 HERE
22,815
the times we supported with emergency food between july22
and june 23
the NUMBER OF EMERGENCY MEALS PROVIDED THROUGH OUR 3 DAY PARCELS between july 22 and june 23
FOODBANK SESSIONS between july 21 and june 22
205,335
1352
9,749
total food vouchers processed by our 14 foodbanks across the city
404
registered referral agencies
843
INDIVIDUAL
referrers
issuing our vouchers
registered, regular volunteers supporting our 14 locations
350
You can read our July 2021 - June 22 Impact Report here
our history
2007
'It began with a big fry-up!'
In 2007, Nigel Adams, working as an Evangelist at Christ Church, Chilwell, heard about Hope 08 - a national campaign to encourage churches to unite to reach out in word and deed to the whole nation for a whole year. He invited local church leaders for a 'big breakfast' cooked on a borrowed camping gas stove, to hear the vision.
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Preparations began with a prayer gathering of 100 people in Beeston Square. At the end of the event local Councillors Pat & Lynda Lally happened to pass by and were introduced to Nigel who asked them, “How can the churches serve Beeston?”
2008
Hope in the Park
January: Hope 08 for NG9 was launched at the Pearson Centre. Hundreds gathered to share vision and offer help.
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February: Great Big Student Gardening Week. In response to Pat & Lynda’s request, church volunteers gathered to clean up streets and gardens in student areas of Beeston- over 100 bin bags filled and great friendships made.
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Summer: Hope in the Park a massive free festival as a gift from the whole church to the community local attended by 2000 people. This was a huge springboard enabling the local church to think even bigger
2009
Parish Pantry
Revd Wayne Plimmer, Vicar of Beeston Parish Church, asked Nigel to enlist help from local churches to support the Parish Pantry a small soup kitchen run by the parish church in a small Portakabin. A vision developed for a more holistic project at a bigger centre.
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Hope in the Park returned, even bigger and included an evening outdoor worship concert and a big open air Sunday service attended by many local churches.
Dozens of people began to meet and pray to launch Healing on the Streets for Beeston
2010
Hope Nottingham registers as a charity
By January 2010 Nigel had been exploring where to go next with this growing Hope movement. He met with his friend Alasdair Kay, Director of Derby City Mission who encouraged him to take the work of Hope across all of Nottingham. The following week Revd Richard Turnbull minister of Beeston URC approached Nigel to offer him the use of their building for the Parish Pantry, initially for free.
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In July 2010 Hope Nottingham was established as a charity, in the same week it and Parish Pantry moved into the URC building and Healing on the Streets was launched in Beeston with over 100 people attending the training with Mark Marx.
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Hope Nottingham got off to a flyng start with amazing support from parish pantry volunteers, Capt Paul Ward initially volunteering many hours a week and our pioneer trustees Dr David Cavanagh, Rob Brown, Helen Clark and Gary Stephenson.
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Hope House was officially opened in the summer of 2010 by Mayor of Broxtowe Pat Lally and Revd Bryan Borrodale, former vicar of Beeston Parish church who originally founded the Parish Pantry
Hope Nottingham as a charity was publically launched by Steve Clifford,, Director General of the Evangelical Alliance and Roy Crowne of Hope Together in October 2010 with a church leaders event at Hope House and public worship at The Christian Centre (now Heart Church) in Nottingham.
2011
Hope opens the first Trussell Trust foodbank in Nottingham
From the beginning, Hope House opened every day with a short time of prayer. The work developed quickly. Chair of Trustees Dr. Dave provided a weekly GP surgery drop-in and Church Army Captain Paul Ward provided big-hearted pastoral support alongside our growing team of volunteers.
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Whilst we worked hard to successfully get numerous homeless people housed, growing numbers of ordinary families came to us struggling for food.
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On 30th November we opened the first Trussell Trust Foodbank in Nottinghamshire.
2012
Hope House inspires communities across the city
As the community grew at Hope House, we were also approached by various church groups also seeking to establish foodbanks. We appointed our first Volunteer Manager to support the development, and by December there were foodbanks in Inham Nook and Broxtowe estate. There was rapidly growing need in the Meadows, so a group gathered in November to discuss the possibility of a foodbank there. We had the foodbank open at the Bridgeway Methodist Mission just before Christmas.
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Throughout the year we continued to enjoy wide ranging support for the growing work. Including a sponsored Coast to Coast Bike Ride which Nigel completed along with great friends Reverend Antony Oakley and Pastor Nigel Yates. This raised over £2000 which was more than doubled by the Mayor’s Charity.
2013
Hope opens the first Trussell Trust foodbank in Nottingham
Momentum gathered even more as it became apparent that food support was needed in neighbourhoods all around the city. This resulted in foodbanks opening in Stapleford (pictured), Wollaton, Aspley, Sneinton and Carlton. Each one supported by local churches working together. We are also lucky enough to receive sponsorship for our van.
2014
Hope Nottingham expands to operate 15 food banks across the city
Whilst some parts of the city were covered by other Trussell Trust or independent foodbanks, some of the more impoverished areas needed support, so further Hope foodbanks were established in Bobbers Mill, Radford, Bilborough the city centre and Netherfield, taking our network to 15 locations. Our staff team expanded further with a Development, Pastoral and Administration roles, to ensure support of our growing network and partnerships.
2015
Hope House gets a face-lift and creates a community allotment
Whilst Hope Nottingham’s foodbank network developed, the breadth of community work at Hope House also increased. The numbers of people regularly coming to Hope House not just for food but for holistic support was growing, It was becoming clear that the present church hall café facilities were not big enough. So it would be necessary to improve the dilapidated church space and provide decent toilets and modern catering kitchen. Grants were obtained from Biffa and elsewhere and improvements started in autumn 2015.
Around the same time Hope Nottingham took on the derelict allotments nearby and began to totally resurrect this as a community garden and allotment.
In the midst of everything we continued to reach out to people with the love of Jesus. An Alpha course run at Hope House by Hope Vineyard was a great encouragement to many, especially those who found faith in Jesus!!
2016
Hope House gets a face-lift and creates a community allotment
The modernisation of Hope House was completed in summer 2016 with a much bigger brighter café space and shiny new kitchen. The space was soon filled and number of regular visitors grew even more. The renewed space was officially opened by our dear friends Barbara and Raymond Parker original members and stewards of the United Reformed Church.
2017
Hope House gets a face-lift and creates a community allotment
The range of activities at Hope House also flourished, with a literacy group, IT tuition group, wood work shop and youth work. The Friendship Group that continued from the previous URC congregation also flourished.
The various foodbanks around the city also matured and developed, with some building on this work to serve their communities in other ways too. St Martha’s in Broxtowe added after school activities and advice sessions. The Meadows developed “Sunday Supper” as a meal and fellowship for those served by the foodbank. Carlton foodbank helped to instigate a very popular school holiday breakfast club at St Pauls church across the road.
2018
Hope expands to support employment pathways
From early 2018 the job club at Hope House began to develop, attracting increase numbers and multiplying the number of people getting into work. Our informal approach of encouragement, motivation and connecting people with ongoing crisis support seemed to be highly effective. In addition to Hope House we began to establish job clubs in libraries and elsewhere.
At all of our foodbanks it had become abundantly clear that each place was achieving far more than giving out food, they had become places of growing, thriving community where those helped where joining in, helping and blessing one another.
None of our work would be possible without the amazing support of many individuals and organisations, including Nottingham Forest (pictured)
2019
Hope House offers a home to Springs of Life Church
Springs of Life church, which was previously hosting a foodbank in the city centre were required to move out of their building… and so were welcomed in to Hope House to use for Sunday worship and to work with Hope to serve the community
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We launched our 'Raising the Roof' appeal to repair the roof at Hope House and were overwhelmed by local support.
2020
Rising to the challenge of the pandemic
When the pandemic started Hope Nottingham reacted very quickly. Within a fortnight Hope House had ceased to hand out food parcels at the premises and almost all other services had stopped. Within a month we had partnered with foodbanks across the city to ensure a full delivery network. We worked closely with the Arches who had offered to store an redistribute food that we purchased using very large financial grants and donations. Hope House typically gave out 1800 food parcels per year. In one week in April we delivered 1200. Some of our foodbanks needed to close to protect volunteers, with delivery provided from Hope House instead. Some stayed open and worked tirelessly so that those who could not access help over the phone or online could come in person. This was an extraordinary tome, where we received overwhelming support to help thousands of people. Over 3-4 months we distributed food costing over £150,000 to over 10,000 households.
One other service that we continued and grew during this time was Two’s Company which provides telephone befriending support for those who are at home and isolated. The need for this was greater than ever.
2021
Hope Nottingham rises to the challenge of the pandemic
As the worst effects to of the pandemic began to pass nearly all of our foodbanks re-opened and welcomed people again. Adjusting back has been a challenge but gradually people have begun to return to spending time in community with each other again. Another project that was started during the pandemic, to help those which had been isolated, was a parent and toddler group at Hope House. This has been hugely valuable for young parents who have been so deprived of friendship with fellow parents.
Towards the end of 2021 Hope House established a food club in partnership with Beeston Children’s Centre and family Action. This provides fresh healthy food boxes at very low cost, to encourage people to eat more healthily and to help people move on from dependency on free food parcels.
2022
Hope Nottingham focuses on community and supporting increased demand from the cost of living crisis
In January we appointed a part time Chaplain to support our growing volunteer and staff teams and to continue development of our Christian community. We hold a new Community Meal May with an aim for monthly In May, Nigel Adams, our Founder and Director announces his long considered decision to step aside, taking an extended period of leave over the summer to return in mid October as our part time Ambassador, with a view to exploring a national role with Hope Together, who were his initial inspiration to establish Hope Nottingham. The current Ops & HR Manager is appointed as Interim Director.
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Thanks to funding from The Trussell Trust, we enable Citizens Advice outreach in Hope House twice a week from February 2022 and in Aspley and Broxtowe from September 2022. Debt advice in Beeston and Carlton also begins from September
2023
Hope Nottingham's Carlton Community Hub is awarded Runner up in the Pride of Gedling Outstanding Community Project Awards
In April our Interim Director was appointed as permanent Director, with a later role name change to CEO. In October 23 our Carlton Community Hub is recognised for its outstanding work in the local community.
2024
We say some fond farewells, but continue our growth
In March 24, our Founder and former Director Nigel Adams decides to step away from Hope Nottingham:
From mid April we expanded our Advice provision via further Trussell Trust funding to include our Mount Zion, Sneinton and Meadows foodbanks.
