More than 100 VodafoneThree colleagues signed up to support longstanding everyone.connected partner, Trussell, during the 2025 Winter Food Collection.
Held in all Tesco stores around the UK between 24-29 November, the Winter Food Collection is the UK’s largest supermarket food drive.
The event is run in partnership with Trussell, the anti-poverty charity and community of food banks, as well as FareShare, a UK-wide charity that redistributes food that would otherwise go to waste.
In total, 105 VodafoneThree volunteers turned up to support the cause, marking the highest ever number recorded by Trussell from a single corporate partner.
Once there, VodafoneThree colleagues were tasked with welcoming customers to the store and collecting donations of the most-needed items for food banks in the Trussell community, such as long-life food and toiletries.
In turn, supporting 41 different food banks across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
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Winter is consistently the busiest time of year for food banks, with need typically peaking amid colder temperatures while energy costs increase.
At this time of year, food banks play a vital role in ensuring that people who cannot afford the essentials can still get by.
Thankfully, an impressive 1.48 million meals’ worth of long-life food items were donated to the collection between 24 November and 29 November, across the retailer’s large and Express stores.
How do Trussell and Vodafone UK work together?
Trussell has been a key partner of the everyone.connected initiative, between its launch in 2021 and the recent milestone of helping four million people and businesses cross the digital divide.
Once viewed as a ‘nice to have’, internet access is now necessary for most parts of life. Around one in six (16%) people referred to a food bank in the Trussell network have no access to the internet at all.
To tackle the negative impact of digital exclusion, the partnership between Vodafone UK and Trussell has helped distribute more than 250,000 free SIM cards.
Vodafone SIMs are loaded with:
every month, for six months
These Vodafone SIMs have been distributed through food banks in the Trussell community as well as the Help through Hardship Helpline, jointly run by Trussell and Citizens Advice.
Looking ahead, the organisations remain committed to a partnership that will support Trussell’s vision for a UK without the need for food banks.
Learn more about the work between Trussell and Vodafone UK by exploring Vodafone’s everyone.connected report, and stay up to date with the latest news from VodafoneThree by following us on LinkedIn and Twitter/X.
