Last orders for Christmas 2017!

Season’s greetings everyone!

We hope you’ve got a fun and festive time planned this year.

As we’re a small community bakery we will be closing over Christmas and New Year to give our bakers a well-deserved rest. We will be turning off the oven and hanging up our chef’s hats on Wednesday 20 December. Don’t worry though because we’ll be back baking our delicious brownies again on Tuesday 2 January.

Fancy celebrating the season with some Rise Brownies? If so, get your order in before 2pm on Wednesday 20 December to help make sure we can get them in the last Royal Mail Christmas post for you (please note we cannot guarantee delivery dates).

Best wishes,

From the Rise Bakery team x

Rise Bakery has been shortlisted for a Blue Patch Award

Hot on the heels of the Great Taste Award came news this week that Rise has been nominated for another award!

We’re honoured to announce that we’ve been shortlisted by Blue Patch in their Social Impact category alongside some remarkable British social enterprises. Blue Patch is an online catalogue of British-made products and services with a sustainability edge. Their business awards recognise the efforts of social enterprises, SMEs and artisans who are committed to creating a principled economy. 

The Social Impact Award is for socially minded businesses aiming to make a positive difference in their local communities, whether that’s with vulnerable people, education or the environment. Rise Bakery is showcased for its bakery training scheme for people affected by homelessness.   

Watch this space for the judges’ verdict on 1 Sept. And don’t forget to bookmark Blue Patch in your browser as a your go-to place for ethical shopping. We think it’s brilliant.

In the meantime though, we need your help! Blue Patch have invited the public to vote for their favourite nominee to win a People’s Award. Winning will give us the chance to tell more people about Rise brownies and mean we can help more people affected by homelessness.

Vote now if you believe in our mission! http://www.bluepatch.org/en/directory/product/p/the-peoples-prize-5

Meet our new bakery Peer Mentor

Meet Bobo, our new bakery peer mentor. He helps show new trainees the ropes.

He has come a long way in a short time. Six months ago, he was homeless. He has since thankfully found somewhere safe to stay, but that was just the start of his journey towards the life he wants.

Despite being off the streets, Bobo was still unhappy. Lonely and bored he spent most of his time in his room.

“I didn’t go out at all”. 

That was when he found out about Providence Row (and Rise Bakery) and met with Asia from the Enterprise & Training team to talk about how to get back on his feet. 

He registered for the charity’s Bakery Trainee Scheme. Despite having “never made cake before in life,” Bobo quickly picked up baking skills and with it, his well-being and happiness improved. 

“I was happy, I told my children, ‘I’m going to make cake’”.

He says that the scheme is “putting me back to normal, where I was supposed to be, because I was also drinking a lot before and now they say, two weeks, three weeks without drinking, and now I’m feeling better. Mentally, physically, I’m okay. I’ve got something every Wednesday, Friday, I have to go do something, something that I like.”

Bobo didn’t stop there! Not only has he completed his Level 2 Food Hygiene accreditation, he’s also taken part in IT classes, Job Club, and recently started the Gardening Trainee Scheme.  

With past experience in security, Bobo is eager to get his badge back and return to work. He is seeing Annette, our employability coordinator for one-to-one support to achieve this.

“That’s why I like this place, they get me a lot of help and I know I’ll get back to my work, my security work, or other jobs.” 

His love for the kitchen has led him to become a bakery peer mentor supporting and helping new trainees in the kitchen. 

Bobo has found that the activities at Providence Row have helped support his well-being as well as develop practical and transferable skills. He is happy and excited about the future.
When asked about Providence Row, Bobo said: 

“My advice would be to join this place. Because they really help you a lot.”

‘Fresh and zesty’ Rise blondie makes Great Taste judges smile

We won! We won! We are chuffed to bits to announce that Rise Bakery has been awarded a Great Taste Award for the second year in a row. We learned on Tuesday that our tempting White Chocolate, Orange and Coconut Blondie – our newest product – has picked up an illustrious gong from the Guild of Fine Foods. The judges loved the ‘fresh and zesty’ taste of our little golden cake bars, adding that the combination of ingredients ‘made them smile.’ And news of the award has certainly made us smile too, even more than usual! 

Andrea Eleuteri, our head baker who designed the blondie earlier this year said: 

‘Our staff, trainees and volunteers have worked so hard to deliver a consistently professional service this year, and being amongst the best food producers in the country for the second year in a row, means the world to us. We believe winning such a prestigious award inspires our trainees to strive for further excellence. It confirms our customers’ belief in us and help us drive sales to reinvest to help and support more vulnerable individuals.’

The blondie joins our Raspberry and White Chocolate Brownie as the second of Rise’s products to win a one star award, meaning judges have declared them both to be ‘simply delicious’. We couldn’t agree more. 

To give you a bit of background, Great Taste is widely acknowledged as the most respected food accreditation scheme for artisan and speciality food producers. Judged by over 500 of the most demanding palates, belonging to food critics, chefs, restaurateurs and producers, as well as a whole host of food writers and journalists, the Great Taste Awards offer a prestigious badge of honour for the winners and a clear sign to consumers that they are choosing a high quality product. 

So how are we celebrating? Well, apart from dancing around the centre bragging to anyone who’ll listen, we thought we’d share the smiles with you, our wonderful customers, with a week-long flash sale. Just use the discount code BLONDIE* to receive 15% off your purchase of White Chocolate, Orange and Coconut Blondie boxes. 

*This discount code has no cash value but can be redeemed for 15% off any order
of Orange and Coconut blondies from our website. The code is subject to availability. 
This offer expires at 11.59pm on Thursday 31 August 2017. We reserve the right to
withdraw this promotion before this time/date.

From Buffalo to Brick Lane

We recently hosted an exchange visit from Daniel, who works in a homelessness service in Buffalo, USA as part of Homeless Link's Trans Atlantic Practice Exchange. He's written this fantastic blog about his experiences with us.

Daniel here. I just wanted to take a little bit of time to describe my extraordinary experience this April at Providence Row. 

I was lucky enough to be selected to participate in the 2017 Trans Atlantic Practice Exchange, sponsored by Homeless Link and the US National Alliance to End Homelessness. The Transatlantic Practice Exchange is aimed at developing best practice connections between US and UK homelessness service providers around a variety of topics. These topics are selected by participants and part of the application process. 5 individuals from the UK come to the US & Vice Versa.

My topic of choice was exploring how social enterprise can be used by organisations to provide both employment and training to individuals experiencing homelessness.
It only made sense that I was matched with Providence Row & specifically RISE Bakery!

While I only had the opportunity to spend seven days or so at Providence in total, everyone I encountered there made me feel as if I had already been part of the team for multiple years (yes even you too Pooja). 

Through shadowing and picking the brains of both Dom and Andrea, I began to see the origins and growth of Rise Bakery, practices and structures that sustain it, and most of all how Rise manages to stay focused on both high quality products and high quality services for trainees. When it comes to social enterprise, that balance is more of an art than a science.

Dom and Andrea also arranged some amazing experiences that exposed me to other various social enterprises all over London. I got to chill out at Canvass Café and see how a large national charity like Crisis runs its Crisis Café. Unfortunately I did not see Russell Brand at his Trew Era Café, but I was able to buy some amazing coffee at Old Spike Roastery and chat with some of the founders around their enterprise and mission. 

I did my best to get my hands dirty as well! I was able to meet a couple of trainees and assist in making and serving breakfast (literally I just washed dishes). Later on I did the same with some baking, specifically a batch of Rise’s new orange and coconut blondie brownies. And one night I was able to do some street outreach with St. Mungo’s.

While studying social enterprise was my primary mission, I couldn’t ignore the other services and supports around Providence Row. Whether that was chatting with Will about accommodation policies or hearing all about volunteer engagement from Stef, everything I did contributed to a positive experience.

I am still trying to wrap my head around everything I learned while in London. One thing is for certain, couldn’t have dreamed of a better experience! Thank you Providence for hosting me, and keep up the great work!
 

A year of Rise

By Nicola Robson, Marketing Manager

Rise Bakery started out a year ago today selling three flavours of brownies online from our base in Aldgate. As part of homelessness charity Providence Row we already had a kitchen, brilliant chefs, a fantastic group of baking trainees and volunteers, and a small bakery wholesale social enterprise, but we had never sold any products online before. It was an entirely new venture, with new products, name and website. I remember anticipating the launch on April 4th with both excitement and trepidation, not knowing what 2016 would bring.

A year on our fledgling social enterprise really has risen. Since our launch in April 2016 we’ve won prestigious awards like A Great Taste award for our white chocolate and raspberry brownie, and come runner up at the Third Sector Awards for best re-brand. The Observer’s Jay Rayner and Great British Menu’s Matthew Fort have tried our brownies, and loved them! And we’ve have shout-outs on Twitter from cooking legends Nigella Lawson and Nadiya Hussain. We’ve run stalls in Spitalfields Market, taken part in food festivals and are now on the verge of launching three new products including a mocha brownie, an orange & coconut brownie and a biscotti, a recipe brought to us by Andrea our lead baker who joined us in 2016.

We couldn’t have done it alone! We’ve had help from a food designer in developing the new brownie flavours. Advertising agency Unreal UK developed our new brand pro bono with great results. And a brilliant group of volunteers have helped us build and develop the website, sold our products at stalls as well as supported us with a range of other tasks to help us get off the ground. The Big Issue supported us with several features in their magazine, and even asked us to bake their 20th birthday celebration cake which featured their first ever front cover.

The icing on the cake is that beyond all this Rise Bakery has supported 13 bakery trainees in the last year (through our accredited bakery trainee scheme) with seven of them having achieved accreditations with us. Our trainees will always be at the heart of what we do and we would like to thank them, and all of our customers, friends and partners for being part of this wonderful community. We’re looking forward to another jam-packed year ahead.

A sweet partnership - RedLaw and Rise Bakery

Here at Rise Bakery our customers are very special to us, not only for buying our delicious brownie boxes, but also by supporting our trainee schemes for people affected by homelessness. This week we went to visit Dee from RedLaw Recruitment, our regular customer and partner company, to find out more about why they choose to support Rise Bakery and Providence Row...

What does RedLaw Recruitment do and what is your role there?

We are an executive legal recruiter based in London working with law firms to assist them in attracting the best talent. We also work with associate lawyers and partners of law firms to help them secure their next move within their professional careers.

I am RedLaw’s marketing manager and look after internal communications, branding, content, web and social media, advertising etc. As we’re a small team I also pick up some other responsibilities such as coordinating our relationships with charities such as Providence Row and Rise Bakery.

Why do you send Rise brownies to your candidates on their first day in their new job?

We have supported Providence Row for several years and when we heard about their Rise Bakery we thought it was the perfect fit for us. It seemed an excellent way to extend our support for the charity.

We pride ourselves on working in collaboration with candidates searching for new roles. And we can work with them for months at a time to find the perfect fit for them and the law firms they work for. We often form long-lasting relationships with them and aim to provide them with a high level of service. We thought it was a lovely gesture to give candidates another reward once the hard work of getting a new role – all the applications, interviews and meetings – is done. It’s a nice little surprise gift to them on their first day to wish them luck. They can also share it with their new colleagues to help break the ice on their first day in a new office. Obviously they taste amazing as well.

Rise Brownies also come with a story behind them. There’s a leaflet with a quote from a former trainee talking about how the bakery has helped him get back into work and accommodation. Our candidates always thank us and comment on the story behind the brownies. It’s a great talking point and we get lots of lovely feedback which we send on to the team at the bakery.

What made you choose Rise Bakery?

There was a strong synergy between the two organisations. We are helping people into new roles, and so are Providence Row and Rise Bakery.  We loved the idea that Providence Row’s clients are working in the bakery and that by buying the brownies, we are helping to fund people’s training and help them back into the world of work.

How else do you support Providence Row and Rise Bakery?

We also support Providence Row’s ‘Working on It scheme’, a 10-week employability course open to trainees and people using the daycentre. The scheme includes a range of workshops run by centre staff and company partners around searching for jobs, building a CV, interview skills and much more. We’ve be supporting the interview workshops on a quarterly basis. Two of our consultants, Adam and Raj, attended one recently and went through CVs, set up a mock interview panel and gave interview technique tips to two trainees. One trainee in particular was very nervous before he started, but once he relaxed he interviewed really well. He came across as friendly, responsible and a team player. He would make an excellent member of a team. We fed this back and he came out of the workshop more confident about future job interviews.

Our recruitment consultants help the trainees figure out what their strengths are and what they could say in response to standard questions. They can also advise on the qualities employers are looking for such as reliability and honesty. Trainees can then develop a list of keywords to focus on during their interview. Sometimes people aren’t used to selling themselves, they can’t put into words why they’d make an excellent employee. Our recruitment advisers can help them find those words so they’re better prepared for their interviews.

What advice would you give to our trainees about finding a new job in the future?

We always advise our candidates and the trainees we meet in the workshops to be unique. People are attracted to people and everyone has got different strengths and qualities. No one person is the same and no one job is the same so be yourself and stand out from the crowd. We could have five candidates going for the same role all with the same experience and skills, but the person who gets the job will be the one who the interviewers think will fit best with the organisation and the rest of the team. The trainees we have worked with have so many great strengths and qualities, the challenge is helping them to see them, and to find the words to show them off at interview (which doesn’t always come naturally or easily). It’s a matter of practise, and we’re very proud to be helping people to do this in the safe, supportive environment of Providence Row.

What our team said about RedLaw recruitment?

‘RedLaw Recruitment are our idea of the perfect customers. We love that they congratulate their candidates with a Rise Brownie box, and that way directly help to support and spread the word about our trainee schemes for people affected by homelessness. They also get involved with our employability schemes, sharing their skills and experience with the people we’re working with, who are trying hard to get back into work, training and education.’ 
– Dom, Enterprise and Training Manager

‘Having RedLaw Recruitment involved with our “Working on it” programme has been incredibly helpful for the people taking part. Many have never been given any guidance around interviews techniques before, so getting advice from experts in this area is incredibly helpful and can make a real, tangible difference to their confidence. Our trainees come out of the interview training session with a renewed confidence in themselves and their ability to find employment in the future.’ 
– Asia, Employability Coordinator
 

A 'tight, supportive community' for our trainees

Rise Bakery is part of Providence Row, a charity that has offered trainee schemes to people affected by homelessness, regardless of their support needs, for more than 6 years. 

We wanted to find out more about how our trainee schemes help support people with mental health issues, so we caught up Alana, an Occupational Therapist at Chase Farm Hospital’s forensic mental health service, to find out why she refers people into our schemes. 

“My work varies from patient to patient but my main objective is to help people develop their independent life skills to get them ready to move back into the community. I work on a rehab ward which runs activities including cooking skills, but in addition to this we take them back out into the community to find services they can work with as well as work experience placement opportunities such as Providence Row.” 

Here at Providence Row (the home of Rise Bakery) we pride ourselves on offering a safe, welcoming space for people to build up their skills and confidence. Alana explains. “They give patients the opportunity to get off the ward and do a ‘structured activity’ away from the hospital. It helps them feel as though they are independent in the community and this is really important for them. It’s a gradual process and takes time. 

Our trainee schemes in catering and baking help people develop transferable skills, but for Alana’s patients, they also help them start to think about what they might want to do when they leave hospital.

“A lot of patients want to do paid work, but it might not be appropriate for them yet and Providence Row is a great starting point for them.”
 
Trainees can also take advantage of our other services, including IT lessons, help with getting into work, training or further education and support with mental health and substance misuse issues. We work hard to make sure our schemes are accessible to everyone and that our trainees feel safe and supported while they’re with us. Alana describes how one trainee had experienced abusive comments and a lack of support at another work placement. But at Providence Row and Rise Bakery, he has been able to flourish:

“When he started working with Asia at Providence Row, he saw that not all places were like his previous work experience placement. Now he’s got so much confidence and he is excited about the future and wants to try new things. He feels valued as a trainee at Providence Row. Soon he’s going to be discharged from hospital and that will be a big change for him, but being involved with Providence Row will give him some continuity after he leaves hospital. He’ll have somewhere familiar to go to and people he can trust to talk to as he adapts to his new life.”
 
When we asked Alana whether she would recommend our trainee schemes to other therapists, she said she would ‘absolutely’. 

“At Providence Row they support our patients properly. They are part of a tight, supportive community. It’s a place where they can feel normal again.” She continues.

It’s great to hear from Alana about how we’re helping support her great work with some of Chase Farm’s patients and we’re looking forward to continuing to work with her long into the future.

If you want to find out more about Providence Row’s trainee schemes you can visit our other website www.providencerow.org.uk to find out more.