THRIVING COMMUNITIES
At McCain we like to do all we can to support local communities and help those in need.
From donations, to volunteering, to fundraising for charities, we’re always happy to get involved where we can. Here are just some of the ways we’re giving back.
Community Shop: Supporting Local Families
At McCain, we believe in bringing people together over great food while making a positive impact in our communities. That’s why we’re proud to support the Community Shop, a social enterprise dedicated to providing essential groceries, learning opportunities, and free meals to families in need.
We’ve worked in partnership to open the Eastfield Community Shop in Scarborough, which is fully funded by McCain.
Through our partnership, we’ve donated nearly £1.3 million worth of products to help stock the store, ensuring that thousands of families have access to affordable, nutritious food.
In just one year, the Eastfield Community Shop has made a real difference:
- Over 3,000 people in the community have received support.
- Members have saved more than £1.4 million on their shopping.
- Over 2,500 hub courses and cookery clubs have been completed, helping families build skills and confidence in the kitchen.
- The Community Kitchen has served more than 9,000 free kids’ meals.
By working together, we’re helping to create lasting change, offering not just food but also education and support to empower local families.
SUPPORTING FAMILIES
McCain are pledging £1 million of support to family fund helping make teatimes easier to enjoy for parents with disabled or seriously ill children. Discover more about our partnership with family fund.
Supporting FareShare
We’ve partnered with FareShare since 2013. As the UK’s national network of charitable food redistributors, FareShare do amazing work taking good quality surplus food from across the industry and getting it to nearly 9,500 frontline charities and community groups.
Since March 2020, we’ve donated over 1.3m meals to FareShare. This includes our first raw potato donation in June 2020, which provided 380,000 meals.
But it’s not just UK communities that benefit from McCain donations. As a global business, we’re committed to donating 200 million meals to food banks and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) around the world by 2025.
INSPIRING THE FUTURE GENERATIONS
Grow your own potatoes with schools
Building on our commitment to educating children about food and farming, McCain has partnered with Earth Cubs to bring the journey of food from farm to fork to life.
This exciting initiative introduces young learners to the importance of regenerative agriculture through a fun and engaging animated episode featuring Heffa the Cow and their best friend – a potato! Aimed at children aged 3-11, the video is packed with songs, fun facts, and lovable characters, encouraging kids to understand where their food comes from, how they can make more sustainable choices and inspiring the next generation to care for the planet.
Apprenticeship programme
In 2012, McCain launched an engineering apprenticeship programme to ensure we have the best talent in place for generations to come. This has recently been extended to our office-based functions, to broaden the opportunities further.
We’re proud to say we now have apprentices right across our UK sites, all of whom are studying towards industry recognised qualifications, whilst gaining valuable on-the-job experience.
Employee volunteering
In April 2022 McCain launched our Chips In volunteering programme, which gives every member of staff one day a year off to volunteer at a local charity. To date our team has undertaken hundreds of charitable hours in the UK. But this is just for starters.
We’re working with Psalt, a not-for-profit organisation who exist to find, develop and provide opportunities for underrepresented talent to enter the workplace and thrive.
All members of McCain Great Britain’s senior leadership team are mentors on the Psalt rise programme, which pairs executives from Fast Moving Consumers Goods (FMCG) companies with young, black talent looking to gain insight into the sector.
Globally, McCain also pledged to support farmers and vulnerable families with 50,000 hours of employee volunteering by 2025.
In addition, our Community Stars scheme offers grants of up to £1,000 to local community organisations or charities that our McCain colleagues volunteer with or fundraise for.
As leaders in the hospitality industry, McCain are passionate about supporting and investing in the next generation of UK talent.
McCain is dedicated to sponsoring 100s of budding street food entrepreneurs, by partnering with UK charities to help change lives through great street food.
Our Streets Ahead programme, powered by KERB, nurtures future food stars from less advantaged and challenging backgrounds, by providing access to the KERB classroom and giving applicants the opportunity to build their skills and experience. Successful candidates have the chance to pitch for up to £10,000 investment towards their own street food business.