Aldi lends helping hand over festive period

The donations across Angus and Tayside were part of a nationwide programme in partnership with Neighbourly.

The company supported local charities, community groups and food banks across the whole Tayside region on Christmas Eve by donating 3004 meals to those in need.

Working with Neighbourly, the supermarket paired up its stores with local charity partners in their local areas to collect unsold fresh and chilled food when stores closed early on December 24, with the stores repeating the initiative on December 31.

To further support local communities this year, Aldi’s Emergency Winter Foodbank Fund saw the supermarket also commit to donating £250,000 to charitable organisations throughout the winter season.

Both the festive food donations and fund are part of Aldi’s successful partnership with Neighbourly, a community giving platform that links businesses to charitable organisations.

The organisation was founded in 2014 to help businesses deliver meaningful and sustainable community investment, and has reached thousands of locations across the UK and Ireland.

Since then it has developed into an award-winning, market-leading initiative that serves some of the world's biggest companies and supports thousands of local good causes.

All of Aldi’s 980 UK stores donate surplus food to good causes, all year round, with over 27 million meals donated to good causes since its partnership with Neighbourly began back in 2019.

Liz Fox, corporate responsibility director, said: “We are incredibly proud to have supported so many amazing charities and community groups in Tayside this Christmas, helping them to provide warm and healthy festive meals to those in need.

“We know that the festive period will have been a particularly challenging time for so many this year which is why we also launched our Emergency Foodbank Fund – allowing us to support even more organisations.”

Steve Butterworth, from Neighbourly, added: “Christmas is always a busy time, but this year was, without doubt, one of the busiest. The donations from Aldi are vital for so many people and we’re really pleased to be working together to help those in need.”