Bligh’s Meadow has a proud history of community engagement, supporting local charities and organisations, by developing campaigns, creating events and raising awareness amongst our local customers.

Over the years Bligh’s has proudly supported Demelza Children’s Hospice, a local hospice that supports families who have children with a serious or terminal condition, with various campaigns and fundraising initiatives, including the annual Pumpkin Hunt and this year’s One Great Day event. The charity helps young people with complex needs get the most from life, achieve ambitions, do new things and support their families to manage and thrive and Bligh’s are delighted to continue their partnership.

Bligh’s Pumpkin Hunt 2019

Sevenoaks in Bloom

Bligh’s proudly support Sevenoaks Town Council’s entry – Sevenoaks in Bloom, in the South and South-East Bloom competition. Sevenoaks in Bloom is about caring for the environment, protecting wildlife, and encouraging the community to come together in caring for our town. Starting in the Spring and throughout the Summer Bligh’s installs floral hanging baskets across the Centre to add even more greenery to the Centre, helping attract wildlife, while creating a stunning environment for the people of Sevenoaks to live, work and enjoy.

In 2021 Sevenoaks Town Centre won the Gold award and will be entering the National competition in 2022.

Sevenoaks Market

A market takes place in the Bligh's carpark every Saturday, with a wide range of local goods on offer, from fresh bread to arts and crafts stalls. The market is run in collaboration with Sevenoaks Town Council.

How our retailers give back

Between the Lines

Loved for their difference and product selection.

Between the Lines carefully select ranges of beautiful products with interesting and unique back stories. From Charlotte’s Web to Azuni London and award winning candle makers St. Eval, you can find a perfect mix of brands, perfect for gifting and with a focus on sustainability.

Between the Lines stock Queen’s Award winners St Eval

The first ever Queen’s Award for candle manufacturing went to St Eval, representing the highest accolade for business success and sustainable practices. The honour is only given for commercially successful products, services and management that benefit the environment, society and economy.

From protecting wildlife on site and championing plastic-free packaging, to helping customers understand the benefits of sustainable production.

“As we have grown over the years, we have always strived to put sustainability at the heart of all we do. I am immensely proud of the team here at St Eval in the way that the whole team have worked so hard at building a not only successful, but also an ethical and sustainable business which continues to go from strength to strength.”
St. Eval’s CEO Ian Greaves

Gail's

Making good food go further

Gail’s try to keep surplus food to a minimum, wasting as little as possible. Any leftover food is carefully set aside from the bakery and donated to charities in the neighbourhood. They are always looking for more charities to support, so if this is yours, please get in touch.

COOK

From the founding of COOK in 1997, the ambition for the business was to create a company that was good for shareholders while also Nourishing Relationships with everyone who it comes into contact with – employees, communities, suppliers and customers. In 2013 COOK became one of the UK’s first certified B Corporations, part of a global movement of companies reinventing business as a force for good in society...

COOK are in business to nourish people’s relationships with food and each other. They think of this Nourishing Relationships in four pillars:

Between business and society – This includes investing 3,000 hours collectively in supporting or inspiring other organisations through volunteering time and expertise and maintaining 100% renewable electricity in all COOK shops and kitchens.

With COOK’s people and their work – From keeping the difference in pay between the highest and lowest paid people at COOK within 15x, paying the Living Wage and sharing 5% of profits annually. The company also values the importance of offering jobs to people needing help into work following prison, homelessness or other challenges through their RAW Talent Programme. Since launching the programme in 2014 they have recruited over 100 people through the scheme and learned a huge amount along the way.

With Food & Where It Comes From – COOK now source 100% of their chicken from UK higher welfare farms, they have introduced more sustainable alternatives to their plastic food trays, and have halved food waste from their central kitchen and warehouse.

With their customers and their communities – COOK support the local community in a variety of ways from supporting 1,500 community events, 1,500 people who need a helping hand in the kitchen with their Care card and have provided over 2.7 million free meals to school children in Malawi through their partnership with One Feeds Two.

ONE FEEDS TWO

Every time you buy a meal from COOK’s Kids range, they’ll provide a free school meal for a child in one of the world’s poorest countries through our partnership with One Feeds Two. This encourages school attendance and helps raise communities out of poverty through education

With your help COOK have already provided over 2.7 million school meals through One Feeds Two.

For children living in a household surviving on less than a £1 a day the biggest barrier to education is the need to eat. Many kids have no choice but to work or scavenge to survive. Providing a free meal in a school is a hook for education and for the children bettering their lives. The meals provided are also locally sourced where possible, supporting local, smallholder farmers.

CARING HANDS

Keeping food waste to a minimum not only makes good business sense, but it’s the right thing to do. But no matter how careful they are in the COOK kitchen, it’s inevitable that there will be some leftovers. Dale, co-founder of COOK got in touch with Caring Hands in the Community, a church-based charity based in Rochester. From Monday to Friday they feed around 100 people a day. COOK provided them with a couple of freezers, and now, whenever they have leftovers from batch meals, instead of it becoming food waste, they freeze it and dispatch it to the charity. On Fridays COOK also supply two members of staff to help in their kitchen. This support has become an integral part of the Caring Hands operation, and freed them up to make other important investments for the charity. supporting local, smallholder farmers.