Food banks, community larders and payment

Katek

Income would be used to meet overheads - room hire, electricity etc.

You should be able to negotiate free room hire for this, most village halls etc. won’t charge, but paying for electricity and cleaning is appropriate.

www.sofea.uk.com/purpose-projects/community-larder/

This is how Sofea works which might help you.

I wouldn’t charge. The food is being donated. If you’re taking money you may depend someone will try to cause trouble by claiming you’re trading/need charitable status/should publish accounts. There’s one everywhere. Limit the amount each person can take and limit it to residents of your village by all means, but as soon as you start taking money it can get complicated.

Alternatively, a membership scheme of £X a week/month that allows members to take so much at a time.

Will there be a ready supply of goods, or will there be more at some times than others? That might make a difference to how much you can control who takes what, if you are to avoid having a glut of things you can't get rid of.

don't charge.
voluntary donations only.

Income would be used to meet overheads - room hire, electricity etc.

If you charge, identify publicly specifically what the scheme will spend the income on. Relying on donations will mean you regularly have shortfalls of high need items, so you could buy those in with the profits. I don’t think a small charge of £1 will put even the poorest off using the service, but you could make an exception, without advertising, if necessary.

Tricky. I think that quite often things like this need to have a declared purpose, so that everyone knows what they are for. Having a secondary aim can muddy waters.

IMO you (and the rest of the members) need to decide if the primary purpose is to save on waste or alleviate poverty, although obviously it will do both in many ways.

How about a 'pay what you can' scheme? So long as it is anonymous, so the usual suspects don't come in and flash a £20 note and those who are most in need are embarrassed ash the £2 they can afford?

A lot also depends on the sort of community it is - if it is a small country village with a mix of residents you can probably do more on trust, whereas in a larger one, or if you will get 'incomers' from nearby towns, you might have to put a limit on the number of items that can be taken at a time/per week.

Maybe a voluntary payment of £2

I agree with exwife

What would the income be used for?

I do not think there should be a charge as the food is donated and although it is more about stopping waste it will also be used by people that have nothing.