About FareShare

FareShare is the UK’s national network of charitable food redistributors, made up of 18 independent organisations. Together, we take good quality surplus food from right across the food industry and get it to almost 10,000 frontline charities and community groups. Over the past year 54,000 tonnes of food were redistributed by FareShare Regional Centres and FareShare Go nationwide, our charity network serves over 2 million meals every week.

Hunger is a growing issue in the UK and while there is surplus food that is otherwise going to waste, we believe that this food should be used to feed people first.

FareShare’s Strategy & Vision
 

Vision: We have the vision of a UK where “No good food goes to waste”.

Mission: To use surplus, fit for consumption, food to feed those who are vulnerable in the UK by supporting front line charitable organisations that tackle the cause and not just the symptoms of food poverty.

Our Purpose: We are doers. We are a community. We change lives.

Our Values: Passion – for our cause and the challenge that lies ahead

Ambition – to go the extra mile and drive the change that must happen

Respect – for ourselves, each other, our volunteers, our partners and our beneficiaries

Collaboration – it’s only by working with others that we can be stronger

Focus – on providing the best service possible so that we deliver and

achieve the most for our clients/customers.

The role

The role is part of a highly successful and influential marketing and communications team. Our team has transformed awareness of and trust towards FareShare, by executing a wide range of marketing, communications and PR activities, including campaigning, promoting awareness of FareShare’s impacts, amplifying and protecting FareShare’s brand, and delivering effective marcomms support to teams across FareShare and its network of 18 charity partners who operate 36 warehouses across the UK.

As part of your role you will champion the impact that our food partners have on FareShare’s mission to fight hunger and tackle food waste. This work will sit alongside the wider FareShare communication needs below.

The COVID19 pandemic has shone a spotlight on the issue of food insecurity in the UK and with it, FareShare’s ability to get food to vulnerable communities nationwide. We are fortunate to benefit from the support of major retailers, the media, sports ambassadors and a groundswell of public engagement. As a result, there has never been a more exciting time to join an organisation at the heart of public consciousness.

The FareShare brand is much better known now than it was historically. As a result of our work with Marcus Rashford to highlight the issue of ‘holiday hunger’, children who would normally rely on a free school meal going hungry during the holidays, we have seen a 10-fold increase in our news coverage each month. Our website has seen an equivalent increase in the number of visits, donations kindly received from individuals and volunteer applications from people who want to help us help others has surged too.

The success of this relationship is thanks to the work of the FareShare Marketing and Communications team, and the Senior Press and PR officer role has a fundamental role in advocating its impact.

This role is vital in FareShare’s ability to respond quickly to regional, trade and national news media requests for comment, quotes, statistics, and case studies from our partners and beneficiaries. The person in this role will monitor the press inbox and hold the press phone in order to field enquiries swiftly and accurately, with the support of the wider Comms team. It will help maintain the relationship with the Marcus Rashford team and bring the stories of his support to FareShare to life.

The successful candidate will help deepen the understanding of what FareShare do with journalists and consumers. They will build and foster relationships with Regional Centres and the charities and community groups that they support to capture engaging stories that demonstrate the impact of FareShare’s work across the UK.

We want to grow greater awareness of how we fight hunger amongst vulnerable communities and manage surplus food as the most environmentally friendly solution for the food industry., to the audiences we need to influence to get the change we desire – to let no good food go to waste

The successful candidate will be working as part of a high-performing and very supportive team of 11 professionals, and will be directly supported by their line Manager and the Head of the Marcomms department.

We are looking for a highly proactive, enthusiastic individual who cares about hunger and reducing food waste in the UK enough to want to spend their professional time doing something about it.

Ideally they will come with experience or knowledge of effective communications in the food/voluntary sector or agency-side, but most importantly they will have a track record of effective media engagement, an eye for a story and great judgement on when and when not to provide a comment.

They will need to manage relationships with a range of stakeholders, from our Regional Centres and partner charities, to the people from vulnerable communities who receive the food that FareShare provides to the charity supporting them.

They will need to demonstrate a strong work ethic, an ability to swiftly draft quotes and comment for approval, and combine that with the experience and skills outlined below.

This is a great opportunity for someone to make a real difference in two areas, food waste and hunger co-existing - of significant relevance and growing interest to the media, British public, the food industry and government.

Main areas of responsibility

• To manage the FareShare press office

• Work directly with media, journalists and the FareShare network of Regional Centres to communicate FareShare’s story of great environmental, social and economic impact
• Develop and maintain a range of stories, press releases, case studies and case study contacts that effectively raises awareness, interest in and trust towards FareShare and demonstrates impact
• Input into and deliver a comms activity plan in line with the marcomms and PR strategy
• Manage inbound (this role manages the FareShare press office) and outbound contact with journalists and management of journalist visits to FareShare warehouses, charities and food partners.

• To promote FareShare’s work and evidence of impact, especially with the funder of the role
• Copywriting, proof reading and editing

• Seek out and create content demonstrating evidence of FareShare’s work and impact (e.g. case studies, stats, research)
  research, current data) that will engage the media, journalists and MPs
• Identify and share interesting stories internally with team and the food partner funder of the role
• Support the marcomms team with a copywriting/proofing/editing function that helps to sharpen up base copy provided into sparkling stories that really resonate with audiences

Competencies and behaviours

• Demonstrable experience working in/with a food industry, voluntary sector PR/Comms or relevant PR agency role

• Demonstrable experience of using Comms, PR and public affairs to raise the profile of an organisation or a national programme
• Demonstrable experience of managing a busy press office
• Experience of working within communications or marketing with project planning, story/creative development, delivery, monitoring and evaluation
• Professional use of media tracking tools – we currently use Vuelio to monitor press coverage
• Experience of working with, and managing, third party/external agencies

• Excellent written skills including copywriting and proof reading, along with a similar level of verbal communications skills
• A self-starter with proven ability to work on own initiative, meet objectives and tight deadlines under pressure
• Able to demonstrate attention to detail whilst also having a flexible approach and an ability to work in a team
• Good working knowledge of Microsoft Office

 

Benefits

Salary £31,000 – £33,000 per annum

Hybrid / Flexible working, with regular UK travel

25 days’ annual leave + 8 bank holidays

Employers pension contribution

Employee Assistance Program

Interest free bicycle purchase loan scheme

Season ticket loan

Flexible working