M&S launches donation to Mental Health Charity
M&S Food has announced it will be donating 5p from every sale of its customer-favourite Farmhouse bread loaves to Youngminds, the UK’S leading charity fighting for young people’s mental health, to help more young people at a time when record numbers are being referred for help.
In the UK, bread is eaten over 30 million times a day and at M&S it is a staple of our customers shop. 71% of customers enjoy a Farmhouse loaf for breakfast, 81% for lunch, 27% for a snack and even 12% for their evening meal, and 70% of M&S customer have a chat with those around them when they eat a Farmhouse loaf.
M&S launched Youngminds as their charity partner in October 2023, and the donation announced from M&S Farmhouse loaves forms part of the mission to raise £5m of vital funds for Youngminds over the next three years. Funds will be used to support seven million young people – twice as many as before and the adults in their lives through online advice, resource packs for schools, and training and guidance through the Youngminds Parents Helpline.
This Mental Health Awareness Week, M&S Food x Youngminds Partnership Ambassador, TV presenter and mum of three, Rochelle Humes, is encouraging families to ‘talk over toast’, as Youngminds highlights the importance of mealtimes to get the conversation around mental health started.
To help get the conversation started on social media contemporary pop culture food artist, Nathan Wyburn, has turned to toast to remind young people that they are “not alone” – etching an A0-sized mural outside the M&S Foodhall in Battersea, from 50 pieces of toast.
A nation of bread lovers - here’s the knead to know on Britain’s bestselling staple:
Bread is eaten by 50 million people a year in the UK, over 11 BILLION occasions. That means…
• it’s eaten 30.1m times every day…
• …1.3m times per hour…
• …or 21,000 times per minute! 80% of Brits eat bread every single week
The most popular bread pairings for M&S customers are:
• Butter (75%), eggs (56%), tea (45%), jam (44%), and bacon (43%) at breakfast
• Cheese (73%), ham (66%), butter (62%), eggs (49%), tuna (43%), and chicken (40%) at lunch
Youngminds x M&S Partnership Ambassador, Rochelle Humes says, “As a mum, and with one in five children struggling with their mental health, I feel passionately about the work Youngminds is doing to support young people and the adults in their lives.
"Getting the conversation started is the first step to young people not feeling alone with their mental health. I hope the awareness and vital funds that will be raised for Young Minds through the M&S Farmhouse loaf will help people open up the conversation with the young people in their lives over toast or sandwiches, even if it’s just a few minutes a day.”