Ipswich’s Top Up Shops Delivering Vital Community Support, New Research Finds

An Ipswich community project is supplying “more than just the £2 bag of food”, by developing new communities and filling a gap in public sector provision, new research from the University of Suffolk has found.

The Top Up Shops initiative runs out of 10 Anglican Churches in the town, and allows those in the community struggling to make ends meet to fill a bag with vital food and supplies in return for a £2 donation without any need for a referral.

Researchers from the University of Suffolk’s Institute for Social Justice and Crime have published a stark report into the Top Up Shops service, titled ‘When the going gets tough, the good get going’, which has found significant community benefits beyond just the food supplies.

The study, carried out by researchers Dr Mark Manning, Dr Isabella Boyce, and Dr Jennifer Coe, saw the team visit all 10 sites over a 12-week period in spring 2023, which included 40 hours of observations and interviews with 20 service users aged from 18 right through to 70+.

That first phase was followed by a series of workshops in February this year featuring Top Up Shops volunteers and service users, community leaders, local authority representatives, politicians and charitable sector workers, to discuss sustainability of the service, whether it could be considered an exemplar locally and how learning from the case study could inform the service’s development and engagement with others locally.

The report said that each £2 bag could deliver up to £40 of food goods and supplies, with the nominal £2 sum helping to ensure those using the service felt a maintained sense of dignity.

Some interviewees noted that the bag was “more than enough to feed a small family for a week,” and added: “There is little doubt that the cost-of-living crisis has become the main driver behind demand for most participants who use Top Up Shops.”

It continued that the facilities helped reduce loneliness and promote social cohesion, “to the point that new communities were visibly being created across most of the sites”, while the researchers observed “customers regularly queuing outside Top Up Shops at 6am”.

As well as providing a £2 bag of food, Top Up Shops had been able to signpost people to other support services, while some visiting nurses to the service identified “serious health concerns” for some individuals.

The report added: “Without raising any criticism of local authorities, it was a perception that, along with other similar services in Ipswich and elsewhere, Top Up Shops were delivering a service which is demonstrably filling a gap in public sector provision while self-funding to do so.”

The research reported that wider strategic co-ordination of funding and logistics could boost the longer-term sustainability of Top Up Shops, while the service could also help address three of the four priorities outlined in Suffolk County Council’s Tackling Poverty in Suffolk strategy published in 2022 – emergency support, mitigating the impacts of poverty and preventing poverty.

Dr Mark Manning on behalf of the research team said: “While Top Up Shops in Ipswich are by no means the only services delivering vital food and support locally, it is clear that Top Up Shops are considered to be highly effective in supporting those in need within their communities and may be considered exemplars for the ways in which they do.

“Both locally and nationally, challenges remain over the cost of living, including the cost of food and energy, meaning the findings of the research remain as pertinent now as they did when Top Up Shops formed during the Covid-19 pandemic.”

The research was funded by UK Research and Innovation and supported by Top Up Shops and the Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich.

Reverend Lawrence Carey, who helped form the Top Up Shops service in Ipswich, said: “The Top Up Shops are about more than just food, they are about dignity and agency.

“By sharing God’s love with our communities, in real and relevant ways we have seen people’s lives be transformed, which is truly humbling.”

The Right Reverend Martin Seeley, Bishop of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich, said: “The Top Up Shops have been a remarkable response for people who need help feeding their families and themselves.

“I have seen first-hand how they are not just sources of affordable food, but places of support and community. I am so grateful to the volunteers – some of whom have themselves been customers – who are making a difference in people’s lives on so many levels.”

The full report is available to read here.

The research comes as part of the University of Suffolk’s Civic University commitment, which includes pledges to engage in partnerships which ensure the voices of Suffolk’s communities are heard and valued, foster research that addresses real-world challenges in the region and work with projects that drive social change.

Off the back of the study, the researchers have already been approached and developed further work surrounding the charitable sector response to poverty and social justice.

To find out more about Top Up Shops, visit the website here.

For more information on the University of Suffolk’s Institute for Social Justice and Crime, visit the webpage here.