“During these very restrictive days of lockdown, it’s so exciting to get the FoodCloud delivery. It feels like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get!! It enables us to give our residents treats that normally would be out of our budget, and of course gives us extra ingredients to enjoy cooking with.”

Novas McGarry House, a voluntary organisation based in Limerick city that supports disadvantaged adults, has been a FoodCloud partner since 2016, receiving weekly deliveries of food from FoodCloud’s Cork warehouse while also collecting surplus food from FoodCloud’s retail partner Tesco.

Since opening their first service in Limerick in 2002, Novas have grown substantially, now offering a range of services across the country. Their flagship location McGarry house opened as a response to the needs of homeless people in Limerick city. As the country’s first low threshold direct access emergency facility, the service has reduced the number of rough sleepers in the city substantially.

Offering both long term and temporary support to over 60 individuals, McGarry house serves as the first step to a better life for many of its clients. The importance of the service was recognised earlier this year in the RTE docu-series Changing Ireland: My Big Idea where we followed Catering Manager Fionnuala as she received her weekly FoodCloud order, sharing about the impact that food from FoodCloud has had on their service, and their ability to offer healthy meals to their clients. The programme, which was produced in partnership with Social Entrepreneurs Ireland, featured a variety of entrepreneurs around the country including FoodCloud and some of the services that they support through their food.

Since partnering with FoodCloud, Novas McGarry House have rescued over 20 tonnes of food, the equivalent of over 47,000 meals for their clients.  

Despite working in such an important and vital sector that so many vulnerable people rely on, Fionnuala always has time for a friendly chat as she makes her weekly orders, lightening the mood with lively jokes and puns. Over the years she’s become well known, not just for her humour and sense of fun but also for her way of thoughtfully choosing food items for her clients, making sure to include yogurts and desserts as a weekly treat and enjoying the unusual products found in the hub at times.

With her sense of fun, kindness and her dedication to those she works with, she embodies the kindness that is at the heart of FoodCloud’s HumanKind series.

A huge thank you to all of the staff and team at Novas McGarry House for Feeding Kindness as we work together to get Food For Ireland.

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