Author: Maz Baker

30 Years of Prospects Trust!

Posted on by Maz Baker

Thank you to everyone who supported our 30th Anniversary Open Day on the 14th September 2019. We have never seen Snakehall Farm so busy. To everyone who supported the day, volunteered their talents and time or donated a prize or donated to our 30th Anniversary Appeal – a HUGE Snakehall Farm thank you.

Raffle Donors including pilot Chris St John for a money can’t buy flying experience, Woburn Safari Park for their Family Day Out plus Gloof, Pleasurewood Hills, Tesco Ely, Costa Coffee, M&S, The Barber Lounge, Dion Gallichan Photography, Trustees of Snakehall Farm, Elk, Sealife Centre, Bedford Lodge & Spa, Belle’s Beauty Boutique, Zoe Slater-Tropic, our new venture Prospects Trust Unwrapped, The Farm Team at Prospects Trust, The Roberts Family and many others for their amazing prizes & donations.

Spud up to:

Our super staff team (from office to field to shop) who always go the extra acre plus their friends and families. Our Co-workers plus their families, carers and friends who make Prospects Trust the place to be! Our Trustee Board and our other volunteers who give us their time expertise and support freely. Our Donors, Supporters and Funders – too many to mention. Our Solidarity Partners Emmaus Cambridge for making it a “smashing” one. Our new social landlord Lighthouse Ely & our 30 years (and many more) farm landlord Cambridge County Farms. The 1st Baldock Templars for their car parking expertise and proving many little hands making light work.

Finally special mentions to the super duo Ken and Trish Harris, Turners, Ernest Doe, The Days, The Roberts, The Thakes, The Peaks, The Reeves, The Cornells, The Ashtons Families. The Employee Volunteering corporate volunteers from Gilead who helped the team get the farm fit for an Open Day and all the other unnamed (because they are shy) supporters!

Please share any of your photos from the day with us on social media @tillytractor or email them across to the Farm Office.

Finally our £30k for 30 Years Funding Totaliser is currently at £22,230….will hit our target before Christmas? You can still donate online at: £30K for 30 Years Appeal or why not come along to our next hair-raising fundraiser Spooky Snakehall 2019, book your tickets here: Get Tickets Today!

Meet the Artisans

Posted on by Maz Baker

We have created a niche for the artisans and the local creatives in our “Pod” wall within Unwrapped. We wanted to bring a “Not on the High Street” flavour to Ely’s actual High Street and showcase the talent in the neighbourhood. With only four more pods available to rent (£10 per month plus a very low selling commission) we have filled our pods with some unique, eco and oh it will so go go products. We will feature our Pod Producers in future posts but if you want to see what the likes of Dragonfly Soaperie, Lil Glad Rags, The Faraway Tree and Eveterraniums have created you will have to pop in the shop.

To book a pod please contact Tom Cockerton at Unwrapped 01353 662010

Two more sleeps (or not)

Posted on by Maz Baker

While you are all dreaming of refilling your reusable containers strange things are going on in Ely. Shopkeeper Tom is putting the finishing touches to Prospects Trust Unwrapped and we need a few shout outs to the people who are getting us across the finishing line:

A big shout out to our local Mayor, Cllr Mike Rouse, who will be turning the key on the 4th and who has captured our faces in the front cover of the Elyi Magazine.

Sean from SG Auto Tint in Soham who at 11pm is preparing our window decals. We hope Tom is practicing his barista skills and keeping Sean fuelled up on the Hot Numbers caffeine?

The new Unwrapped Staff Crew – Clare, Paul and Kin who have been training on the till, kitting up the kitchen and sprucing up the shop – as well as keeping Tom company.

The wonderful volunteers from the Lighthouse, the local Ely Job Centre cohort, SE Electrical Services, Ruth at Re-imagine and our firm Farm Friends from Emmaus and of course Ken – our now resident decorator!

The amazing local businesses, from Cutlacks & Samovar down the hill to 68 Market Street around the corner, the sustainable champions from longstanding farm wholesale company COFCO and the exciting new Cambridgeshire Sustainable Food Hub, lot of our new suppliers including Yare Valley and Gourmet Brownie – we look forward to working with them and many more as the shop builds up a footfall of customers.

A huge wow from Eco Ely – Hayley and her social media subscribers have been keeping us in the loop and drumming up local support.

A big thank you to the start up funders and donors, from Cambridgeshire Community Foundation/Cambridgeshire County Council’s Innovate and Cultivate Fund, Enterprise East Cambs and our crowdfunding family – seriously without your financial backing we would still be working on the business plan.

A recognition to those that have already paved the way in Zero Waste – our neighbouring businesses across the border in Norfolk – a wave to Graham at Ethical Ernie, Cata at Re.Source and Elizabeth at The Green Parrot for sharing their stories in creating refill larder shops of their own. We also wish to thank all the other like minded indes sharing their stories on Zero-Waste Start Ups on social media.

And finally here’s to working in partnership with Thera, Mencap, Cambridgeshire County Council and the Learning Skills Department in creating a hopefully sustainable and innovative project that becomes the norm for Ely. Now our plea is to the residents of Ely – please come shop little, light and often in our new shop, support our trainees in their learning and eat local, seasonal and ethically. Together we really change change the world (one tiny corner at a time).

Famous Five Minutes

Posted on by Maz Baker

We don’t have a PR department, a MarComms Team or even a Webmaster (is that still a job) but we are blushing on the telly, grinning our radio faces off and signing autographs on the latest edition of the Elyi Magazine. Suddenly after 30 years of “growing differently” we appear to have become popular! Now we are not contemplating making Tilly Tractor audition for the next series of Love Island, Farmer Mark isn’t trading in his trademark hat for botox, Hannah hasn’t traded her steel-toe caps for red carpet stilettos, Shop Manager Tom hasn’t got an agent (yet) and Maz knows she is only in the photos to make everyone else look much, much taller, but we are feeling a bit more like local celebrities thanks to some great articles, telly slots and radio interviews.

We hope you caught some of our recent interviews but for those who have missed them or those (erm yep Farmer Mark’s family) who want to relive the magic moments, here, for a short time only, are some links to the media malarkey:

Listen to Tom, Hannah and Maz talk about the new Ely Shop and the Prospects Trust Open day with Chris South on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07kv6z9

The Farm captured in action by BBC Look East

continued

and finally!

YES you can ask for our autographs at the 30th Anniversary Open Day on the 14th September but you will have to buy a raffle ticket or two!

The Opening Ceremony

Posted on by Maz Baker

After almost a year in the planning, months in the funding and practically weeks in the shop fitting we are almost ready* to turn the key to the door of Prospects Trust Unwrapped! *who are we kidding we shall never be ready but we are very eager.

The Grand Opening Ceremony will take place at Unwrapped HQ, 13 Lynn Road, Ely, Cambs CB7 4EG from 11 for a VIP key turn at 11:30 am. You can rsvp a place on our Facebook Events page: https://www.facebook.com/events/947315945617658/

Barista in Training

Posted on by Maz Baker

We have all the gear from Hot Numbers Roastery, including a state of the art coffee machine and the tastiest of beans sourced fairly and ethically. Now we just need to transform the milky foam into coffee art in time for service! Our new Support Worker Clare has been rehearsing for the Grand Opening this Wednesday 4th September.

Staff member holding a cup of coffee made on a barista machine

Help Unwrap Unwrapped

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With just two more sleeps to our grand opening we are still looking for local support with our Crowdfunding appeal: https://chuffed.org/project/unwrap-prospects-trust-unwrapped-fill-the-refill-stock-the-shop or donations can be made through our localgiving page: localgiving.org/charity/prospectstrustatsnakehallfarm/project/unwrapthesstock/

Thank you to all those who have already donated, volunteered or supported this exciting new venture, we could not have done this without your help. Team Prospects Unwrapped!

Brewing up a storm

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Thanks to our local supplier and highstreet indie, Samovar Tea House , we will be serving an Unwrapped house blend of loose leaf tea. Samovar Tea House was established in 2011. They are an independent, family-owned speciality Tea house and café located at 23 Forehill, Ely.  They stock a vast range (over 100 types) of high-quality loose-leaf teas including many exclusive house blends created at Samovar. Samovar’s teas and herbs are imported from all over the world.

We are bring Hot Numbers to Ely! Hot Numbers state that speciality coffee is a movement – a drive for better coffee and a better living for coffee farmers. For coffee to be qualified as speciality, it must be graded between 80-100 points on a 100 point scale. To achieve this, coffee producers painstakingly hand pick and sort fully ripe coffee cherries. With all this extra effort in the supply chain to enhance flavour, Hot Numbers accept the responsibility as a speciality roaster to select exciting yet ethical Arabica coffee for your cup. Hot Numbers believe a great cup of coffee is a simple pleasure, but it is the product of many hands and a lot of passion. Come try a Flat White, Expresso, Macchiato, Latte & Cappuccino in a real cup in Ely!

Five Minutes of Farming Fame

Posted on by Maz Baker

Did you see how beautiful Snakehall Farm looked on BBC Look East last night (21/08/19). Its true what they say, the camera puts on acres! We are super proud of all of our Co-workers and staff for showcasing the special place that is Prospects Trust. For those of you who weren’t glued to the tellybox at 6:30pm last night here are some snippets.

The Intro

Organic Hannah

Farmer Mark and the 1st debut of the Snakehall Song!

A Resounding Success!

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The Shovel the Hovel Project receives a boost of funding that made us all sing at Snakehall Farm this summer. The Prospects Trust received over £900 from ReSound after their beautiful summer concert. We spoke with our Trustee Jane Kershaw about her involvement with ReSound:

“I am very proud to be a member of ReSound, a 36 voice choir that performs regularly around Cambridge, singing an eclectic contemporary and traditional mix of a cappella songs from different cultures, rich in harmony and rhythm.

We have been singing together since 2010, when the choir was created by our musical Director, Rowena Whitehead.  Rowena has been called “a musical activist”, a neat phrase that sums up a thread weaving through all she does. She is a performer, a composer, a teacher, a singing leader, a facilitator who inspires everyone she works with.

ReSound filling with beautiful voices at St Cyriacs in June 2019

She believes that singing runs deep within us all and reaches parts that nothing else touches. For Rowena singing is more than a pleasure, it’s an essential expression of life that helps individuals and communities thrive.

This is one of the things that makes Tuesday evening rehearsals so special:  we only do music that touches the heart and everyone knows each other pretty well after singing together for such a long time.

We usually sing to raise money for charitable causes, so everyone in the choir was delighted to sing for Prospects and get to know a bit about it as an organisation – and a total of £950 from the concert at St Cyriac’s was an added bonus.”