Thermal specialists help food charity

Thermal insulation specialists from a Telford firm are working with a vital charity that supports over 1,000 community groups and schools by rescuing and redistributing surplus food.

The team from Seymour Manufacturing International, on Stafford Park, have supplied two sets of ‘Cold Stop’ thermal curtains to The Felix Project – a charity organisation that received royal approval with a visit from King Charles III.

The curtains have been used in the charity’s East London depot, at Poplar, for its large cold storage facility.

They will help to maintain the required temperature in the facility to ensure that the rescued food is stored in optimum conditions to keep it fresh for as long as possible in order to distribute it far and wide across the London area.

Ross Clarke, business development manager at SMI Limited, said: “We are very pleased to be working with such an important charity, and it’s a great opportunity to see our products in place doing such a key job.

“Our thermal insulation products are used by companies, supermarkets, the NHS, and charities all over the UK and beyond, and we have a strong reputation for excellence as the products really do make a huge difference.”

Felix Project Poplar depot manager Nayyer Syed said the organisation was focused on supporting the fight against food poverty and waste.

“We have been extremely impressed with the SMI Cold Stop curtains, and they look set to help us maintain the right conditions in our storage facility.”

The charity was founded in 2016 by Justin Byam Shaw who said: “The cost-of-living crisis means increasing numbers of people simply cannot afford to feed their families.

“Many of the organisations we supply are seeing the demand for their services more than double, and all of them need more food from us. We have more than 600 charities and schools on our waiting list, of which 175 applied to us in the last three months alone.

“His Majesty’s support has created new capacity for The Felix Project to rescue and distribute more food by providing freezers and fridges to 800 community organisations across our network, and to invest in our own frozen storage facility.”

The charity has been working with the British Asian Trust, FareShare UK, The Trussell Trust, and catering equipment supplier Nisbets to deliver the fridges and freezers across the country.

Last year it rescued more than 12,000 tonnes of high-quality food, which would otherwise have gone to waste and caused damage to the environment.  

Pictured: SMI’s Cold-Stop curtains in action at the Felix Project depot in Poplar, East London