In these troubling times, there have been so many changes in all our lives, often bringing feelings of fear and uncertainty.  At times like these, we appreciate the things that we may have taken for granted before.  One of those things is our NHS.

Yes, we do! This lovely creation made by residents here in Bruton

Here are some things you may not know about our NHS:

  • it was launched in 1948
  • it is the largest employer in the UK and 5th largest in the world
  • when it was launched the budget was £437 million (£15 billion in today’s value), in 2020 it will be £145 billion
  • at the time of writing, an additional £6.6 billion has been approved for the NHS to tackle the coronavirus

This is a service we should truly value, particularly at a time like this when the original aim, to provide a health service for all no matter what their means, is so crucial.

Our head baker Charlie Griffin with our donation ready to deliver to Yeovil Hospital

With this in mind, we at Taylors of Bruton decided we wanted to do something to show our gratitude to the NHS in some way.  We have been affected by this outbreak just like everyone else.  We have had to stop selling at markets which has meant having to furlough some of our wonderful staff.  Nevertheless, we all agreed that we wanted to do something.  So it was the brain-child of the two Charlies, Charlie Griffin (head baker) and Charlie Ginger (head of sales) to simply donate some of our delicious bread and hot cross buns to our hard-working NHS staff.  Charlie’s wife Jaz works at Yeovil hospital so she got onto organising it straight away.

Jaz delivers 100 loaves and 80 packets of hot cross buns for all staff to help themselves to

We donated 100 loaves and 80 packets of hot cross buns to Yeovil hospital last week.  Apparently they went ‘like hot cakes’ or should we say ‘like hot cross buns’! (Maybe they’d heard about our buns being voted the best in Somerset hehe).

These lovely ladies are our heroes

So many smiles despite the difficult situation

You can see all the lovely smiles on their faces and that makes it all worth-while.  The sacrifice many of these people are making is massive.  We heard from Boris what an amazing job his nurse did for him when he was struggling with his life and it’s this kind of selflessness that we are celebrating.  Bread won’t solve this crisis but kindness, communities coming together and teaching our children the value in service to others is priceless.

To demonstrate our support for the NHS we have also changed our logo on our social accounts.

We want to continue to donate to our NHS staff.  Our message is reaching others too and we are now in talks with fellow suppliers in the area who want to join in.  We are so proud to have started something that shows our NHS just how proud we all are of them.