Community Grocery Middlesbrough

Brilliant idea and helpful friendly staff too

Great service in times when needed, a excellent range of foods and a lovely friendly service

Great value surprising variety of fresh, frozen and store cupboard foods. Not forgetting the helpful and friendly staff.

Very cheap and a big help to the lower paid and pensioner's

Joined this shop today, I was surprised at how much I had for my money. All this in pic was 5.00 you pick so many of each item listed. The staff who run it are amaizing. Thank you so much

Amazing place for those in need and very helpful and friendly staff

We go here a lot as our closest shop selling day to day essentials (banannas etc). Its a lovely concept and as long as you stick to their standard £4 shop (where you get 12items of things like baked beans, dry pasta etc) its good value.Its ran as a charity, but you wouldnt really know that as a customer, it doesnt have the feel of a food bank, theres no stigma to going, which is great.At times this place feels very uncharitable, you can 'pay it forward' for customers who cant afford their £4 shop, something I've done a few times, but every time Ive had a customer in the queue ahead of me having card after card declined, scraping round for coppper to pay, Ive never seen this be offered or advertised. When Ive challenged staff about it ive been told its because people take the mick, which I'm sure they do, but I dont think thats an appropriate attitude to take and struggling customers need to be given the benefit of the doubt. They also are prone to pricing their paid for items a bit unfairly. A 25pack of nutmeg (morrisons own) size one nappys currently sell for £1 in morrisons (which works out as 4p per nappy). In the grocery, they give out 3 of the exact same nappys for one item, which works out at 11p per nappy. Almost 3 times the price of morrisons themselves. The same can be said for most the other basics they sell as 'little extras'. A bag of morrisons own sweetcorn is currently £1.69 in morrisons, but the grocery are selling the same bag of morrisons own sweetcorn for £2. Anybody with any sense would walk to heron where its on 3for£3 but the most vulnerable in our society arnt always in a position to do that. It wouldnt bother me so much, but these items are donated to the grocery in good faith, I dont think those donating would approve of such an exploitative approach to pricing certain items. Ive pointed out inflated prices a few times but and the lack of change to any of the prices following my complaints would suggest its intentional.As much as I do have bugbears about the place (dont get me started on their policy to offer chocolate to every child who comes in the shop) it has saved us a fortune while things have been very financially tight for us (mat leave, redundancy etc). You just need to have your smarts about you and not assume that evety item is a bargain when its not. You also need to look pretty closely at what your getting as they can be swines for trying to conceal that foods rotten or that seals have broken etcIf you havent popped in already then Id recommend anyone give it a try. Especially if the cost of living crisis is affecting you.

Excellent value. Pay £5 annual fee, and then you can shop for £4 for 20 items daily, situated in St. Barnabas car park.Excellent service by volunteers, cafe open on Thursday mornings 10-12. Everyone welcome