ShowerBox
Annual Report
March 2023 - March 2024
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Registered Charity no. 1198395
© ShowerBox
ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
This annual report provides a review of the financial year 28 March 2023 - 27 March 2024, highlighting our achievements and impact, including an overview of our financial performance and position. It aims to demonstrate the trustees' commitment to the responsible stewardship and management of charitable funds. This report also serves as a directors’ report in compliance with the Companies Act 2006.
As an opening note, the trustees of ShowerBox wish to extend their huge appreciation for the contribution and dedication of our volunteers and generous donors. Their unwavering support has made it possible for ShowerBox to elevate and expand our projects and services.
Contents
| ● | Letter from Chair pg 2-3 |
|---|---|
| ● | Our story so far pg 4 |
| ● | What we do pg 5 |
| ● | Our impact pg 6 |
| ● | Governance pg 7 |
| ● | Our Finances pg 8 |
| ● | The Future pg 9 |
| ● | Thanks pg 10-11 |
© ShowerBox
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Letter from Chair
Every week, we receive quotes and updates from our guests at our Central London and Birmingham projects, which are a testament to the unwavering support of our CEO, Sarah Lamptey, our many volunteers, donors, partners, supporters, as well as our Trustees. Their compassion, dedication, and generosity have been fundamental in helping ShowerBox touch the lives of so many guests during the past 12 months..
One guest dropped in to our Central London project to let us know that he has now been off the streets for close to 6 months, is working full time and his next plan is to study. Another told us proudly that he is also housed, and has not consumed alcohol in over a year. Others shared that they go to work straight after their shower with us, and others simply want to share words of thanks:
“I really thank you for all you do. You are so patient with everyone."
“For a minute I felt like I was showering after an Alpine hike in the mountains. I feel so refreshed”
“I am proud of your team. Well done”
The past year has seen several “firsts”; June recorded the busiest Saturday ever at our Central London site when we served over 200 guests (including 63 showers). We completed the conversion of our first all-in-one shower van for ShowerBox Birmingham and we continued to attend Barking Council’s ad-hoc health clinics for people facing homelessness.
We secured our first competitively funded grant in 2024 - from the National Lottery - adding to the generous support we continue to receive from Vitol Foundation, St. Giles Trust and contributions from supporters via Just Giving. The additional monies will enable us to focus on a priority area for ShowerBox over the next 12 months, namely, our volunteers. We would like to provide them with Conflict Management training, improved and standardised training material, and opportunities to build a cohesive community.
In November 2023, our CEO and founder received an MBE for her contributions to those facing homelessness. We’re proud of you, Sarah!
As we look to the year ahead, we want to prioritise measures to ensure expansion into other cities and regions, supported by established procedures and protocols which uniformly express the ShowerBox culture, values, and principles. We also hope to expand our partnerships with other organisations to provide our guests with greater support (e.g. mobile health clinics).
© ShowerBox
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Finally, as I enter the start of my second term as Chair, we hope to develop clear succession plans for the board and set out the skills and expertise the board needs to support ShowerBox’s growth trajectory.
We extend heartfelt gratitude to everyone who has played a part in our journey. Together, we continue to positively touch the lives of many facing homelessness, and together, we will continue in our efforts to bring dignity to them wherever there is a need.
Sharmistha Law, PhD
Chair of the Board of Trustees
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Our story so far
ShowerBox is a registered charity, founded in 2018 by Sarah Lamptey MBE to provide a free and safe shower experience for individuals experiencing homelessness, both visible and hidden within our community.
The number of people experiencing homelessness in the United Kingdom has been steadily increasing over the last 15 years, although a nationwide problem, it is much more prevalent in London, and ‘Britain’s second city’ Birmingham.
1Recent research from Shelter showed at least 309,000 people in England spent the end of 2023 homeless. This is an increase of 14%, 38,100 people, in one year. The total number of people experiencing homelessness in London has risen 11%, from 150,000 to 167,000 people. This accounts for around 1 in 51 people. In Birmingham it’s 1 in 71.
At ShowerBox our mission is twofold; to provide those facing homelessness with a chance to maintain a sense of dignity and health; and to provide a community of engagement that can serve as a bridge to them accessing other services. Several guests upon leaving the showers have spoken of feeling "alive" and "human again".
Being powerless to maintain personal hygiene compromises mental health and physical well-being. We have created and crafted our service based on feedback received from guests. By providing a place to wash and groom, ShowerBox offers both a physical and a mental boost to its guests and reduces stigma from the public and the spread of preventable, debilitating diseases which costs the NHS millions each year.
1 https://england.shelter.org.uk/media/press_release/at_least_309000_people_homeless_in_england_today
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
What we do
ShowerBox is led by its founder, Sarah Lamptey who was awarded an MBE in November 2023 for the services she has provided to people facing homelessness. Sarah is supported by a board of 5 trustees with broad ranging experience, and 70+ dedicated volunteers who provide their invaluable support on a rotational basis every week.
Each ShowerBox project offers showers, fresh underwear, period products, toiletries (which guests may take with them), hot drinks, snacks, and a community for those facing homelessness in Central London and Birmingham.
ShowerBox’s mission is committed to:
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offering a reliable and dependable service to those who experience uncertainty and a lack of autonomy in their daily lives
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creating an environment that is welcoming, inclusive, respectful - we refer to our attendees as “guests” and treat them as such
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look out for and safeguard our guests and each other
The ShowerBox team have developed an expertise in creating and maintaining pop-up, mobile shower spaces, through converting vans and vehicle trailers into shower booths, complete with hot water, fresh towels and changing facilities as a means of serving its guests.
This allows ShowerBox to remain versatile in where and when it provides its services and lays the groundwork fo r broadening its reach through the creation of additional shower spaces in the future.
ShowerBox has established relationships with funding partners such as the National Lottery, JustGiving and Vitol Foundation that allow it to fulfil its mission each year. Complementary to this funding is its broad array of relationships with donation partners such as Beauty Banks, Lush Retail and Gregg’s, that donate items such as towels, toothpaste, underwear, toiletries and hot snacks each week.
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Our impact
We are incredibly proud of the support we have provided for our guests to date. Since the launch of ShowerBox in 2018 we have provided approximately:
Over the past 12 months alone, our Central London service has provided:
Our volunteer community is pivotal to ShowerBox’s success. Each week, our Central London project is reliant on a team of 11 volunteers to support the Project Lead across the 6 hour service day provided to guests. Over the last 12 months, our volunteers contributed over 2000+ hours of their time, equivalent to one full time employee!
Measuring future impact
We are currently in the process of designing a framework to capture comprehensive metrics to measure our weekly impact at our service locations. This will include:
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Operational Metrics
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Community Engagement Metrics
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Financial and Resource Efficiency Metrics
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Awareness and Outreach Metrics
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Long-term Outcomes
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Governance
The name of the charity, as it appears in the Register of Companies, is ‘ShowerBox CIO’. Its charity registration number (England and Wales) is 1198395.
The address of the charity’s registered office is:
ShowerBox CIO
3rd Floor, 86-90 Paul Street,
London
EC2A 4NE
The charity appointed 3 Trustees before inception, and have subsequently appointed 2 more trustees; one of which is also the Honorary Treasurer.
Those who were trustees of the date that this report was approved, or who served as trustee during the reporting period include:
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Dr Sharmistha Law (Chair of Trustees)
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Paul Taylor (Trustee and Honorary Treasurer)
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Caroline Allouf (Trustee and Project Lead)
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Claire MacNeill (Trustee and Project Lead)
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Bruce Loudon (Trustee) - appointed on 1 June 2023
Those to whom the trustees delegated day-to-day management of the charity in a senior management role during the reporting period include:
- Sarah Lamptey, Founder and CEO, ShowerBox (in post since 2018).
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Our Finances
ShowerBox produces accounts on an annual basis. They are reviewed by an independent company in accordance with Charity Commission Guidelines (CC32a). Key financials from the latest 2023/24 financial year are detailed below.
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ShowerBox started the year with current assets in the form of bank and deposit accounts of £10,013.
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Income of £90,956 was received from grants and donations.
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Total expenditure of £53,679 was spent on providing showers plus ongoing costs for refurbishing the Barking ShowerBox Pilot Project.
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Therefore, total cash and reserves were increased in the year by £33,932 to a year end value of £44,063.
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Reserves are only kept because income is difficult to be assured of, on a year by year basis. We spend approximately £1800 per month on the direct costs of providing showers, underwear and toiletries which is difficult to reduce substantially without regular supplier donations.
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
The Future
The demand for ShowerBox services is evident throughout the UK. It is an unfortunate fact but one in which we are committed to providing our services to. Over the next 12 months, we have 3 key objectives:
● Expanding ShowerBox’s services
We are hugely excited by the recent launch of our first project outside of London in Birmingham City Centre.
We are also actively progressing with a new service location in Barking (East London). The Barking project is our first pilot partnership project and for this location, we will be collaborating with Barking Churches Unite and Barking and Dagenham Council. This pilot project is pivotal in our learnings for future ShowerBox project collaborations in UK cities such as Bristol, Manchester and Newcastle.
ShowerBox is also currently exploring service expansion to other London Borough locations such as Brixton (Lambeth).
● Securing a commercial storage space
We are in the process of sourcing funding to secure a permanent, indoor parking location for the London ShowerBox trailer. An indoor parking facility is vital for the protection of our trailer during winter months and overall, we must mitigate the risk to the trailer throughout the year with a 24 hour monitored secure parking facility. A centrally located parking facility will also enable greater accessibility of the trailer, so that it can be utilised for additional London wide service days throughout the week.
● Building ShowerBox’s operational team
To deliver our funding and operational targets, ShowerBox requires a dedicated operational team member, independent of its current volunteer team, to directly support the CEO. Future appointments of operational team member(s) will be prioritised in the forthcoming 12 months.
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
Thanks
We’re so grateful to everyone who has chosen to support ShowerBox and our mission to provide those facing homelessness with secure and safe shower facilities and hygiene supplies.
Every donation we receive goes to ensuring our ability to offer consistent services and supplies to our guests every week throughout the year.
In particular, we’d like to thank the following organisations and individuals for their generous grants and donations:
Grants:
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National Lottery
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Vitol Foundation
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John Coates Charitable Trust
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St Giles Trust
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Better Green
Donations:
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Jens Dietri
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Gus Miah
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Shirley Baptist Church
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Robert Brass
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Goldman Sachs
Supporters and Suppliers
We are incredibly thankful for the ongoing support from the following brands, charities and individuals who have donated supplies or services to us throughout the past 12 months:
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Arcade
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JustGiving
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Create Balance
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Boucleme
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Lofberg’s
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Crisis
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Decent Packaging
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ShowerBox: Annual Report March 2023/24
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Tibard (now Johnson’s Linen)
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Lush Retail
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Greggs
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Derek Pickles
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Tangle Teezer
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Beauty Banks
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The Hygiene Bank
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St Gile’s Church
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Birmingham Cathedral
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Serving Our Superheroes
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Under One Sky
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Smalls For All
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Call Si plumbing
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Beccy and Simon Pini
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Baylis and Harding
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King’s Heath Lions
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Harborne garage
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Let’s Feed Brum
Volunteers
ShowerBox could not exist without the commitment of our incredible volunteers; with over 70+ individuals onboarded so far, our Central London and Birmingham projects rely on approximately 20 volunteers per week to exist.
We would like to extend special thanks to those who lead our onsite shower operations - their weekly voluntary commitment solidifies the foundations of our project services:
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Caroline Allouf
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Claire MacNeill
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Ally Goddard
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Don Russell
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Bruce Loudon
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Paul Taylor
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ShowerBox.' Annual Report March 2023124 Q ShowerBox Page 12
| Showerbox | Showerbox | Showerbox | No (if any) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| For the period from |
Period start date 28.3.23 |
To | Period end date 27.3.24 |
| Section A Receipts and payments | Section A Receipts and payments | Section A Receipts and payments | Section A Receipts and payments | Section A Receipts and payments | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A1 Receipts | Unrestricted funds to the nearest £ |
Restricted funds to the nearest £ |
Endowment funds to the nearest £ |
Total funds to the nearest £ |
Last year to the nearest £ |
||||
| Grants and donations | 89,672 | - | - | 89,672 | 31,794 | ||||
| CIC Contribution | - | - | - | 19,981 | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| - | - | - | - | - | |||||
| ~~Sub total~~~~(Gross income for~~ AR) |
89,672 | - | - | 89,672 | 51,774 | ||||
| ~~A2 Asset and investment~~ sales, (see table). |
|||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| ~~Sub total~~ | - | - | |||||||
| Total receipts A3 Payments |
|||||||||
| 51,774 | |||||||||
Consumables Staff Costs Vehicles Travel Costs Costs |
21,633 | 19,733 | |||||||
| - | 760 | ||||||||
| 13,206 | 17,071 | ||||||||
| 3,145 | 4,026 | ||||||||
| Marketing | 10,000 | - | |||||||
| Other | 7,756 | 54 | |||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| **Sub total ** | 55,740 | 41,644 | |||||||
| A4 Asset and investment ~~purchases (see table)~~ |
|||||||||
| ~~,~~ | - | ||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| **Sub total ** | - | - | |||||||
| Total payments Net of receipts/(payments) A5 Transfers between funds A6 Cash funds last year end Cash funds this year end |
|||||||||
| 41,644 | |||||||||
| 33,932 | 10,131 | ||||||||
| - |
- | ||||||||
| ~~10,131~~ | ~~-~~ | ||||||||
| 44,063 | 10,131 |
Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period
Unrestricted Restricted Endowment funds funds funds
Categories
Details
CCXX R1 accounts (SS)
10/04/2024
1
| Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees B1 Cash funds B2 Other monetary assets B3 Investment assets B4 Assets retained for the charity’s own use B5 Liabilities |
(agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) Total cash funds Details Details Details Details Signature |
to nearest £ to nearest £ 44,063 - - - - - 44,063 - OK OK Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - - - - - Fund to which liability relates Amount due (optional) - - - - - Print Name Paul Taylor |
to nearest £ |
|---|---|---|---|
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| OK | |||
| Endowment funds to nearest £ |
|||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| Current value (optional) |
|||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| Current value (optional) |
|||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| - | |||
| When due (optional) |
|||
| Date of approval |
|||
| Paul Taylor | 10.04.24 | ||
CCXX R2 accounts (SS)
10/04/2024
2
Report to the Trustees of Showerbox (charity registration 1198395)
Independent examination of annual report and accounts for period 28th March 2023 to 27th March 2024
I can confirm that I have undertaken an independent examination of the annual report and accounts for Showerbox for the financial year 2023/24 following the directions set out in the Charity Commissions ‘independent examination of charity accounts checklist (CC32a). I can confirm that the charity is eligible to have an independent examination undertaken; that I have no conflict of interest that would prevent me from undertaking such an examination and that I am qualified to do so as a qualified accountant with membership of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA). I have planned my examination of the accounts based on the scale, scope and size of Showerbox and have kept a record of the examination of the accounts undertaken and this can be made available should it be required.
This is the second year that the charity has produced a set of Charity Commission Receipts and Payments Accounts and as such it has been possible to undertake analytical review to compare the two periods as contained in Direction 3 of the Charity Commission’s Guidelines. It is pleasing to note that the level of donations and grants has significantly increased in the current year, almost tripling from 2022/23. The percentage level of expenditure in relation to funds raised has reduced from 80.4% in 22/23 to 62.1% in 23/24, with the absolute amount spent on consumables remaining broadly equal with less spent on vehicles and travel costs but a new category of marketing incurred in the current year amounting to £10,000. This position has resulted in a net receipt in 2023/24 of £33,932 which when added to last year’s surplus gives Showerbox just over £44,000 in bank accounts as of 27 March 2024
I have examined the accounting records kept and have noted that the organisation has adopted accounting software Xero during this financial year which has significantly enhanced Showerbox’s record keeping in relation to receipts and payments with the ability to record all transactions and reconcile regularly to the charity’s current bank account. (It is also noted that a further bank account has been opened in year for surplus funds with 32 days’ notice to give a better interest rate) A download from Xero has been used as the source for compilation of this year’s accounts. It has been possible to reconcile the opening and closing position of the charity’s bank statements to the downloaded transactions recorded in Xero during the year and I have also traced a sample of transactions from the account submission to Xero records.
As a result, I can confirm that the accounts presented for the financial year 2023/24 appear to be a true reflection of the accounting records held by Showerbox. The accounts are presented on receipts and payments basis not an accruals basis and therefore do not contain any significant judgements or estimates. This is consistent with my expectations for the size and scope of the charity.
Finally with reference to the directions of the checklist and the proforma for accounts for submission to the charity commission it is my opinion that the format of the accounts provided is correct. It is also my opinion that there are no matters of material significance that are to be directed to the Commission.
Suzanne Tracey BA (Hons); IPFA 18 September 2024