Charitable giving
Financial support is an important part of our commitment to local communities, and we contribute both as a company and as individuals. But it's also about Partners actively forging links and devoting time and energy to become more involved in the local communities in which they live and work. This doesn't just benefit the local community either; fundraising and volunteering help us to broaden our own skills and experience too, which in turn enhances our reputation and improves the service we offer.
Partners across John Lewis embarked on a national baton relay in aid of Beating Bowel Cancer, John Lewis’s Charity of the Year for 2010.
How much we investDonation policyGive As You EarnContact us
How much we invest
So that we can measure and monitor our overall charitable and community investment, we calculate the value of our non-financial contributions (Partners' time, management costs, donations in kind) and add them to our cash donations to arrive at the total sum contributed for the year. 2009-10 marked the Partnership's seventh year of membership of the London Benchmarking Group (LBG), a voluntary membership scheme that helps to develop and promote a process for measuring community investment.
View our charitable and community investment data.
Our Partnership and divisional Community Investment Committees govern our approach to community investment within the Partnership. This structure increases collaboration between divisions, and further promotes greater engagement and involvement at a local level, with individual shops continuing to be responsible for developing local programmes, monitoring the impact of their efforts and communicating their achievements. The Partnership actively encourages Waitrose and John Lewis shops to forge close links with local schools, charities and community groups.
In 2007, John Lewis established a Charity of the Year scheme. Our current charity is Beating Bowel Cancer which works to raise awareness of symptoms, promote early diagnosis and encourage open access to treatment choice for those affected by bowel cancer. Gemma Lacey, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility, says 'As in previous years, we were looking for a charity which was national - to cover all branches - but which was small enough for us to make a difference. This is a charity where we can make a difference by getting people to talk about the illness and therefore more aware - it is the most easily treated form of cancer if caught early enough.'
John Lewis is also a supporter of the Macmillan Cancer Support's World's Biggest Coffee Morning which occurs in September each year. In September 2009, local events in our branches raised around £10,000 in addition to the £10,000 the company donated, along with a further £10,000 of gift vouchers for their main prize draw.
Since it's launch in 2008, Waitrose's, Community Matters initiative has donated over £3 million to a wide range of charities and community groups. This unique scheme gives each branch £1,000 (or £500 in our convenience shops) to share out between three local good causes each month – such as welfare organisations, community groups, schools or local divisions of national charities. Customers vote for their preferred cause using a green token each time they shop and the money each cause is given is directly proportional to the tokens they receive. Under the scheme, customers nominate organisations, with the final decision made by PartnerVoice forums (Waitrose's local democratic bodies). Each branch has a Community Matters Champion, who finds out about potential beneficiaries. In addition, our Head Office donates £2,000 a month and our Leckford Estate farm and Distribution Centre both donate £1,000 a month. Mark Price, Managing Director says, 'At a time when many charitable groups are struggling to raise funds, we will continue to give support to our communities and, in 2010, a further 22 communities will benefit from the scheme as we open new shops'.
Waitrose has a passion for good food and healthy eating, and uses a range of initiatives to encourage children and young adults to eat well and learn where their food comes from. Through Waitrose Education (www.waitrose.com/education), we invest in an established range of projects and in 2009 Waitrose commenced a new three-year sponsorship of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Campaign for School Gardening, which aims to encourage schools to set up gardens, so that pupils learn about plants and gardening.
The Partnership also continues to make significant donations to emergency overseas relief and in 2009-10 donated £50,000 to the British Red Cross Disaster Fund, which makes monies available at short notice for emergency help.
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Donation policy
The Partnership favours charities in which Partners are personally involved. We also like to give donations to smaller, local concerns, where we can make a real difference to our local communities. Areas we particularly support include care for the sick and the disabled; youth and children; care and housing for the elderly; medical research; and welfare and counselling services.
The Partnership does not give money to individuals, religious, ethnic or political groups or third-party fundraising. We also do not make donations towards buying advertising space. With all the donations we make, the Partnership aims to be a responsible member of the local community.
More than 60 per cent of the total cash contributions made by the Partnership are chosen by our Partners (whether based in our offices, shops, distribution centres, farm or production centres) who have the power to decide which local charitable projects they would like to support.
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Key priorities
Key priorities are to develop our processes and tools to identify and measure the outputs and impacts of sizeable community investment projects and our own community programmes using the LBG model; increase the number of Golden Jubilee Trust secondments in line with business growth; and to continue to contribute at least 1 per cent of our pre-tax profits to community initiatives.
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Give As You Earn
The Partnership has set up a Give As You Earn scheme with Sharing the Caring, the professional fundraising arm of the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF), to enable Partners to make tax-free donations to a charity or charities of their choice directly from their pay. Donations are made from gross pay each month, before income tax and national insurance are deducted, which means that the amount the charity will receive is more than that deducted from the Partner's gross pay. So, for example, if a Partner wants to donate £10 a month from their gross pay, the amount deducted from their net pay will only be £8 (or less if they are higher rate tax payer).
Through Give As You Earn, Partners can donate to any of the 190,000 registered charities in the UK and to any of the 350,000 organisations recognised by HM Revenue and Customs as charitable. This includes hospices, hospitals, schools, places of worship, scout or guide groups, sports clubs and many more organisations.
Partners can donate in two ways. Rather like a direct debit Partners can nominate a charity or charities to benefit from a set amount each month and the money is deducted from their pay. Alternatively they can set up their own CAF Charity Account, paying in a minimum of £10 from their pay each month. Charity Accounts act like current bank accounts: donations are still transferred from Partners' pay each month tax-free, but the Partners can choose when and how they spend the money with their 'charity chequebook' or CharityCard. For example they can put cheques into collecting tins in the street or make secure donations online.
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Contact us
If you have a cause you think we could help you support, please get in touch. Please check our donations policy for those we don't support. Please note that our preference is to support smaller, more local causes. Contact either your local John Lewis Community Liaison Coordinator or local Waitrose branch.
Because we are contacted by so many organisations asking for help throughout the year, we can't always give you a swift reply, but we will reply as soon as we can if we are able to help.
John Lewis
Contact the Community Liaison Coordinator of your local branch.
Waitrose
Contact the branch champion for community giving at your local branch.
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