It’s toot, toot Tooty goodbye…

…and thanks for everything

When Tooty Gibbs set up a food bank in Chipping Campden in 2012, she didn’t think it would be for long.

More than 13 years later, the backbone of what became an essential part of North Cotswold Foodbank, is hanging up her green fleece and saying goodbye.

Her volunteer mission began when she went to her granddaughter’s school harvest festival in 2012. “There was a speaker from the Coventry Foodbank who was so inspiring that I thought we could do something here,” she recalled. “I got in touch with Trussell who were working from Naunton Chapel. Then I spoke to the Pastor of Campden Baptist Church Phil Deller and he said we could get on with it. So we did.”

Now the outlet opens every Friday at the Baptist Church in the High Street, and North Cotswold Foodbank provides more than 1,700 emergency food parcels per year from its seven centres which are run almost entirely by volunteers.

“We had hoped it would be a temporary fix and that there’d be no need for a food bank in the end. But that’s not how things turned out,” said Tooty. “That said, it has been a blessing to be able to help people. I have always had fantastic teams around me – it couldn’t have happened without them.”

Her fellow volunteers gathered to wish her well, along with Chair of North Cotswold Foodbank Garry Dick.  Food bank Manager Kevin Carden thanked Tooty from the bottom of his heart. “You’ve been absolutely wonderful,” he said. “Things won’t be the same without you.”

Pastor Phil Deller thanked Tooty with a hug and noted that she had also pioneered the opening of the church’s wellbeing café, now called Renew55, which opens every Thursday. “Thank you for your vision in both those ministries,” he said.

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