News – Belfield Group

Westbridge Supports Local Primary School

Ysgol Bryn Garth school has developed a nurture room to support vulnerable children to give them space, privacy, skills and support to help improve their self-esteem, happiness and confidence, which of course will help them now, but also later in life.

The importance behind nurture rooms is to provide a short-term focused intervention to deal with issues that are blocking learning for some children. Nurture rooms provide safe spaces for children who are struggling academically, or struggling with behaviour and isolation. To make the nurture room more welcoming, it is important to have the right decor to make the children feel calm, safe and comfortable.

Westbridge offered the school to choose from a selection of furniture and the chosen piece was duly collected and installed.

The school advised:

‘We started using the room on Monday, the children absolutely love it, and the staff are asking if they can visit it too!

Thank you so much again for your support and kindness, we really do appreciate it.’

Belfield Goes Electric!

We’ve taken receipt of our first all-electric van this week at Belfield Home & Leisure, Ilkeston and it represents another milestone on our electrification journey, adding to the electric fork-lift trucks we’ve been introducing to our fleet, to replace gas-powered fork-lifts.

The Toyota Proace City L1 Electric Icon Van 50kWh Auto, replaces a Diesel Citroen Despatch and eliminates tail-pipe emissions, helping to reduce C02 and improve local air quality.

Reece Hawley our Electrician will be using this new electric vehicle to work across site, visit contractors and pick up parts when needed. He’s roughly covering 25 miles a day at present and says its lovely to drive and extremely quiet.

Westbridge Beach Clean at Talacre

We had a great morning out, for the beach clean at Talacre and conditions were warm but very windy! We split into small groups and spent a couple hours collecting from 10am and that left the rest of the day free.

Thanks to everyone who joined in and it was particularly nice to have the children along. It was obviously a good educational exercise and they all enjoyed the experience too. We managed to collect around 40kg of litter between us, that Flintshire Council kindly agreed to recycle.

Jem Recycling – Zero Waste to Landfill

We’re delighted to welcome Jem Recycling to our Ilkeston site this month. The arrival of the Jem team extends our Zero Waste to Landfill partnership. It all started at our Westbridge sites 10 years ago, where together we have been consistently achieving Zero Waste to Landfill ever since. Last year, Jem also started at Tetrad and now this successful partnership continues at Home & Leisure.

Pictured are the very first plastic and cardboard bales processed and ready for recycling.

Epic and Emotional Walk for Local Charity

Ben’s Den is a local, Ilkeston-based charity that provides free holidays for families of children with cancer. They have five caravans on the East Coast and at Tattersall Lakes. Belfield Home and Leisure support the charity through Troy Smith, Health and Safety Officer, choosing to support them because it is a local charity and also every penny raised goes directly to Ben’s Den.

Troy relates the story of their epic walk:

“Before COVID happened I was planning on walking the Derwent Valley Heritage Way to raise funds for Ben’s Den. The Derwent Valley Heritage Way is a national trail that follows the River Derwent from Ladybower Dam in the High Peak to the River Trent at Shardlow. I chose this for the challenge because the route passes Pride Park Stadium, the home of Derby County, and decided to finish at there because Ben was a Derby County fan, and it gives us a round 50-mile route.

“So… fast forward two years, I began re-planning the walk, started asking around if anyone was interested in the challenge and set up a group with around 20 people interested. We had our first initial meeting in February and set a date for the walk for April 2^nd and 3^rd 2022. I decided to give all my weekends and Tuesday evenings up to start training for the 25 mile per day which we needed to achieve. It was suggested that we all booked a hotel in Matlock overnight, which was the halfway point. Belfield had kindly paid for transport originally when I had the mad idea pre COVID, so ‘all’ we needed to do was train for the event.

“On the morning of 2^nd April at 05.30, with a cold, frosty, but beautiful start, the bus picked us up and took us the hour and half drive to Ladybower, where we excitedly set off for the first 25 miles. Everyone was in good spirts and team moral was high. We had a support bus which I had pre-arranged to meet us at certain points along the way to provide us with food and drink and a ten-minute rests… 15 miles in, members of the team were developing blisters and blister patches were starting to be used in abundance.

“We entered Matlock on day one with an excited atmosphere, rested and ate as a team. We were ready for day two…

“Day two started at 06.30 with breakfast and me handing out food, premade by my wife for everyone. Blister patches were re-applied and at 08.00 off we went. Three miles in we had to pull one guy out with walking difficulties – day two was obviously going to be a challenge.

“By 10 miles morale was low with some team members struggling. We all pulled together and dug deep to help lift the team. Then we were informed we could actually finish inside Derby County’s stadium which was amazing and filled us with renewed determination… We trudged along and on sighting Derby the pace quickened, spirits lifted… but blisters were rife.

“Five minutes from Pride Park we stopped, had a group hug and I gave a little speech to the team which reduced most to tears. We marched into Pride Park with our heads held high, to a gathered crowd of family and friends clapping and cheering us.

“What an amazing weekend with an amazing group of people, completing an amazingly hard challenge… for a fantastic charity.”

New Website and Product Configurator for Tetrad

We have exciting news about Tetrad’s website.

In response to the fast-moving upholstery market, Tetrad are about to launch a brand-new website and product configurator which will allow consumers to visualise a customised product in their own home.

The site will make navigation through the product ranges more intuitive, features updated product descriptions and will enable the user to individualise their chosen products with fabrics, feet, leathers etc. The user will then be able to see their chosen product as they have specified it in their own home through the new AR tool.

These upgrades will ensure that, whilst retaining its position as a premier heritage brand, Tetrad offers its customers 21^st century technology to inform their purchase decisions.

50 years’ service award

2022 has seen us present our first 50 years’ service award to the Group’s longest serving employee, Gerry Bean.

Gerry has been in continuous employment with the Group for over 50 years – what an accomplishment!

To celebrate this momentous landmark, Gerry was presented with a watch to thank him for his exceptional service.

Retaining our loyal and committed staff has always been a priority, and we continue to strive to achieve this for all our employees by providing them with job security, opportunities for development and, above all, treating everyone fairly.

Tetrad help refurbish interview room for Lancashire Constabulary

Sadly, there has been much on the news and in the press about a recent rise in the number of victims of serious crime, both vulnerable adults and children.

Tetrad were recently approached by Lancashire Constabulary to help them refurbish their interview room for child victims and victims of serious, sexual and violent assault. Research shows that victims respond better when they are interviewed in a comforting, informal space so, to help create a more sensitive setting, Tetrad have donated a sofa, two chairs and a rug from their range, replicating more familiar, homely surroundings.

Stuart Masson commented, “The liaison offices couldn’t thank us enough and remarked that the space was now much more warm, friendly and comforting for people who have been through these ordeals. Hopefully it will help the victims speak about them and give the police the information they need to help catch their abusers.”

Westbridge Support Homeless Charities – & Reduce Waste!

As part of our ongoing commitment to minimising our business’s impact on the environment, we encourage our staff to come up with innovative ideas and solutions to reduce waste, however it may arise.

Recently, staff at Westbridge were challenged with the problem of how to ethically dispose of over 800 mattress toppers after a change in customer requirements. Rather than let them go to landfill or become part of a textile recycling process which would consume further energy and resources, they contacted local charities and offered them, free of charge, to be used in a number of ways.

Here are some of the charities and end users that have benefitted from the initiative:

The Wallich is a homelessness charity in Wales. They intend to make use of the sleeping bags in their emergency accommodation in Flintshire and in their supported accommodation in Wrexham, or when individuals move on and need additional layers to fend off the cold. Shian Thomas, Service Manager emailed Westbridge to thank them for their generosity:

“I would like to thank Westridge for their kind donation of the 100 sleeping bags to The Wallich Homeless Charity”

Share is a charity based in Mold which supports families in crisis and people who are homeless in North Wales and Cheshire and also assists refugees fleeing for their lives, wherever they are in the world. On receiving a donation of the mattress toppers, this was their reaction:

We are absolutely blown away by the very generous donation this week, from Westbridge Furniture, Deeside of 100 sleeping bags. These are perfect for the families that we support. A very big thank you to everyone involved at Westbridge, many of our service users will be warm and snug this winter because of your incredible kindnes

Clocktower Enterprises CIC were also grateful recipients of a number of the mattress toppers. Here’s what their Operations and Projects Director said:

“On behalf of everyone at the Clocktower CIC I would like to thank you so much for the sleeping bags. Our adults with profound learning difficulties and autism will make great use of them and they will go a long, long way, we are very grateful for your kind generosity. Thank you again.”

Other beneficiaries include The Salvation Army, ResourceRenew, based in Holyhead and Save the Family, a Chester-based charity caring for the homeless and families at risk of becoming homeless who have multiple and complex needs.

A huge vote of thanks needs to be passed on to the team at Westbridge for coordinating this outstanding effort which underlines Belfield’s commitment to both minimising our impact on the environment and to caring for the communities within which we operate.

Belfield Workforce Support their Local Communities

At Belfield, we are committed to our outstanding workforce and in turn, they are proud to support the local communities they work in. Over the past year every business within the group has undertaken work to support regional and national charities through fundraising activities and donations to help those less fortunate than themselves. Here are some of the highlights.

At Westbridge, the staff have nominated four main charities to benefit from their endeavours – one for each site – which introduces a bit of healthy competition to the fundraising efforts!

Development organised a Christmas Jumper Day and raised £150 for Nightingale House Hospice, a charity based in Wrexham which provides specialist palliative care services for those with life-limiting illnesses.

WB2’s chosen charity is North Clywd Animal Rescue (NCAR). They recently donated sofas for the charity’s on-site, dog friendly café, Doris’s Bunker. Nicky Owen, Media Relations & Fundraising Manager said, “Thank you for the beautiful sofas, they are now in the café. They are amazing and make such a difference and our customers love them!”

In addition, WB2 staff also raised £900 from the sale of redundant scatters – meaning not only was money raised for a fantastic cause, but no waste was generated.

WB8 took part in Alder Hey Children’s Hospital’s annual Christmas Toy Appeal and sent car boot loads of gifts to children who were unfortunate enough to be spending their Christmas in hospital.

Giddo’s Gift, a charitable trust providing gifts or financial grants to teenagers and young adults suffering from Cancer living in North West England and North Wales, also benefitted from a Christmas Jumper fundraiser at Westbridge.

We are also very grateful to Marks and Spencer, who recently donated £10,000 to be split between NCAR, Nightingale House Hospice and Mind, in recognition of the work done by Westbridge in support of the Marks and Spencer ‘Plan A’ reset initiative.

Staff at Ilkeston have also been busy supporting local and national causes in the past few months.

In November, Paloma Faith contacted Home and asked if they were willing to donate some bedding to support a refugee family she was involved with in East London. Bedding was sent to Paloma for the family to help them set up home and start their new life in the UK.

Also in November, Home and Leisure combined to hold a cake sale which raised £307.00 for Cancer Research UK.

In December, to spread some festive cheer, the Curtain department organised a Christmas Jumper Day in aid of The Salvation Army and a collection for the local food bank, the Ilkeston Arena Community Food Bank. Both initiatives were really well supported by staff across the site.

As part of Home and Leisure’s ongoing support for Ben’s Den, an Ilkeston based charity which supports the families of children fighting leukaemia or cancer by providing caravans for holidays, Troy Smith (H&S Officer) is organising a 50-mile charity walk 2^nd – 3^rd April 2022 from Ladybower Reservoir to Pride Park Stadium. We will update on you how you can support Troy in the coming weeks.