## **TRUSTEES’ REPORT**
The trustees are pleased to present their annual report on the affairs of Little Bundles, including the Receipts and Payments Accounts for the year ended 10 August 2024.
## **1.1 Reference and administrative details of the charity, its trustees, and**
## **advisers**
Charity name: Little Bundles Charity registration number: 1190794 Address of principal office: 72 Pathfinder Way, Northstowe, Cambridgeshire, CB24 1AU
Website: http://www.littlebundles.org.uk
Names of trustees: Katie Mee (Chair), Rachel Norridge, Helen Atkins, Sarah Wilson, Judy Roberts
## **1.2 Structure, governance, and management**
Little Bundles is a charitable incorporated organisation (CIO). We are governed by a constitution, with CIO status assigned on 10 August 2020. We operate on a foundational model, where the only voting members are the charity trustees. Apart from the initial trustees, every trustee is to be appointed for a term of three years, with a minimum of three trustees and a maximum of eight trustees. Trustees are to be appointed by a resolution passed at a properly convened meeting of the charity’s trustees.
All new trustees are to be given a copy of our constitution, most recent trustees’ annual report and our accounts.
Due to a couple of short-lived trusteeships, as of 2022 we ask all potential trustees to spend at least six months in a volunteer role with us before being appointed a trustee.
## **1.3 Public benefit**
Little Bundles’ objectives fall within the classification of:
- Disability
- The Prevention and Relief of Poverty
The trustees confirm that their activities are fully consistent with the Objectives and the Charity Commission’s guidance on public benefit has been borne in mind throughout the year. Most benefits are provided to families who lack the necessities to care for and support their young children and are provided as resources in kind (e.g., cots, pushchairs, highchairs, children’s clothing, nappies, safety equipment etc.)
The benefits are provided to people referred to Little Bundles by health and social care professionals and various other charities, housing associations,
and support organisations. The referral system is a reasonable restriction to ensure goods are directed towards genuine need and provides accountability to our donors.
The charity’s operations are restricted to residents of Cambridgeshire. The trustees consider this a reasonable restriction given the network of baby banks across the UK that serve particular localities, the size of our organisation, the available storage facility, location of our donors and the practicalities of collection of goods, and the need to build and sustain close relationships with referring organisations.
## **1.4 Objectives and activities**
The objectives of Little Bundles are the relief of poverty in Cambridgeshire by providing essential items of baby clothing and equipment to parents and families with young children, who are in conditions of need or hardship by reason of their economic or social circumstances.
Our activities in 2023–2024 have supported our duty of public benefit. We have received 218 referrals in this period, which is almost identical to last year. An 83% increase from 2021-2022. This is possibly due to the cost-ofliving crisis increasing the number of families in need of help. While we continue to receive a lot of applications from local council teams and children's centres, we have also seen an uplift in referrals from midwives at The Rosie Maternity Hospital and working from community teams. We have offered deliveries to referrers from Cambridge Citizens Advice, charities aiding refugees and people who have been trafficked (which are based in London but have clients in Cambridge) and some for Cambridge Housing Society and CCC.
We have also used social media to promote awareness of our charity and its activities.
## **1.5 Achievements and performance**
## **1.5.1 Operating model**
We have continued the self-service operating model that we adopted during the pandemic period, in order to facilitate quick access to goods for referrers and have continued to offer deliveries direct to clients’ homes when referrers are unable to collect. There is increased security with an added code to the outer gate of our store.
Our thanks in particular go to volunteer drivers Helen Bengtsson, Tim Morley, Sarah Wilson and Rachel Norridge and occasional volunteer drivers Helen Atkins and Katie Mee. Stock levels have remained healthy, although we have made some purchases of the most in-demand items from funds.
## **1.5.2 Donors**
We remain grateful to a generous regular monthly donation which covers our operating costs.
We have also had £621 of personal donations.
We have seen a reduction in donations via our Amazon Wishlist, to the value of £456 from gifts in kind over the 2023–2024 financial period.
## **1.5.3 Roles within the organisation**
Linda Goudie has stepped down as Website Administrator. This role will be taken up by Sarah Wilson on a temporary basis.
Over the last 18 months the team have tried to find a volunteer to take up the role of fundraiser. Despite advertising on social media and through word of mouth this has not been successful. We will continue to actively promote this.
## **1.5.4 Events**
On the 12[th] April 2024, the Longstanton Brownies took part in clothes sort and put together 33 bundles.
On the 10[th] November 2023 and 30[th] of June 2024, a team volunteers took part in a clothes sort.
## **1.5.5 Social media**
Our presence on social media has continued to be developed by Sarah Wilson Our Facebook page now has over 2,800 followers, up 200 from the previous period. It enables us to recruit volunteers, advertise our attendance at community events, link up with other similar charities, and keep our supporters up to date with our needs, especially via the Wishlist Wednesday feature.
An Instagram page has also been set up this year, with 212 followers to date up 51 from the previous period, which is linked to our Facebook for instant posting on both.
There is also a LinkedIn page, linked to Katie Mees personal Linked In, which is a work in progress.
## **1.5.6 Relationships with other charities**
We support and promote other local charities with similar purposes such as GrowKids Cambridge and Trumpington Clothing Hub.
We liaise with other local baby banks as needed.
A relationship has been formed with the Arthur Rank hospice shop who contact Little Bundles via Sarah when thy have baby items in stock. They have recently donated a highchair, pram, Moses basket and nappies.
‘Party on Potton’ a local community organisation gave us a donation from one of their annual events.
## **1.5.7 Development activities**
Little Bundles clothes donations: There has been no changes to the way that donations have been received over the past year.
## **- 1.6 Financial review, August 2023 August 2024**
Little Bundles finances remain healthy with a balance on 10th August 2024 of £4,322 (£2,814 August 2023). The balance stays reasonably constant throughout the year and from one year to the next as most of our donations are in the form of goods received from the public and then redistributed. It is impractical to estimate the value of these in financial terms. However, we have had some generous financial donations this year, resulting in an increase in our end-of-year balance.
This year our income from financial donations amounted to £5,002 (£5,167 2020/2021). This is made up of a regular corporate donation of £1800, £2,125 from corporate donations, £621 in personal donations (mainly via paypal) and £456 worth of stock donated through our amazon wish list (£1090 in the previous tax year).
Our outgoings were £3,494 (£4,990 2022-2023) – made up regular expenditure £2,590, which includes rent of the storage garage of £1800 per year (though £1950 this year due to a change in the direct debit date), insurance £202, CVS membership of £30 and the website host, £438.
We spent £782 for purchase of items needed to fulfil referrals (£858 2022/2023). We had one off costs for printing for publicity materials £92.
||**Little Bundles**
|**Little Bundles**
|**Little Bundles**
|**No (if any)**|**CC16a**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||**For the period**
**from**|Period start date
11.08.2023|**To**|Period end date
10.08.2024||
|||||||
|**Section A Receipts and payments**||||||
|**A1 Receipts**
Donations from open arch
**1,800**
Donations Amazon wish list
**456**
donations other
**2,746**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**5,002**
**-**
**-**
**Sub total -**
**Total receipts 5,002**
**A3 Payments**
Rent for storagegarage
**1,950**
Insurance
**202**
Web site host
**438**
purchase of babybank items
**782**
cvs
**30**
printing
**92**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Sub total 3,494**
**-**
**-**
**Sub total -**
**Total payments 3,494**
**Net of receipts/(payments) 1,508**
**A5 Transfers between funds**
**-**
**A6 Cash funds last year end**
**2,814**
**Cash funds this year end 4,322**
**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**to the nearest £**
**Sub total**(Gross income for AR)
**A2 Asset and investment sales,**
**(see table).**
**A4 Asset and investment**
**purchases, (see table)**||**to the nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Restricted**
**funds**|**to the nearest £**
**Endowment**
**funds**|**Total funds**
**to the nearest £**
**1,800**
**456**
**2,746**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**5,002**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**5,002**
**1,950**
**202**
**438**
**782**
**30**
**92**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**3,494**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**3,494**
**1,508**
**-**
**1,630**|**Last year**
**to the nearest £**|
||||**-**|**1,800**|**1,800**|
||||**-**|**456**||
||||**-**|**2,746**|**3,367**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**5,002**|**5,167**|
|||||||
||||**-**|**-**||
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
|||||||
||||**-**|**5,002**|**5,167**|
|||||||
||||**-**|**1,950**|**1,800**|
||||**-**|**202**|**202**|
||||**-**|**438**|**1,192**|
||||**-**|**782**|**1,948**|
||||**-**|**30**||
||||**-**|**92**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
||||**-**|**3,494**|**5,142**|
|||||||
||||**-**|**-**||
||||**-**|**-**||
||||**-**|**-**|**-**|
|||||||
||||**-**|**3,494**|**5,142**|
|||||||
|||**-**|**-**|**1,508**|**25**|
|||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**|
|||**-**|**-**|**1,630**|**-**|
|||**-**|**-**||**25**|
## **Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period**
|**Categories**
**B1 Cash funds**
**B2 Other monetary assets**
**B3 Investment assets**
**B5 Liabilities**
**B4 Assets retained for the**
**charity’s own use**|**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
**Total cash funds**
(agree balances with receipts and payments
account(s))|**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
Agreement Error
**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Fund to which**
**asset belongs**
**Fund to which**
**asset belongs**
**Fund to which**
**liability relates**|**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
OK
**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Cost (optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Cost (optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**Amount due**
**(optional)**|**to nearest £**
**Endowment**
**funds**|
|---|---|---|---|---|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||OK|
|||||**to nearest £**
**Endowment**
**funds**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**Current value**
**(optional)**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**Current value**
**(optional)**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**-**|
|||||**When due**
**(optional)**|
||||**-**||
||||**-**||
||||**-**||
||||**-**||
||||**-**||
Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees
Signature
Print Name
Date of approval