Community cafe closure is "a real shame" (From Haringey Independent)

FoodCycle's Station House Cafe closure is "a real shame"

9:30am Tuesday 25th September 2012 in News By Emma Innes

A community café in Crouch Hill is to close after two years serving the community.

FoodCycle’s Station House Café in Stroud Green Road will close its doors for the last time on Friday.

The café, which opened in August 2010, is being forced to close because of a lack of funding.

The restaurant takes surplus food from local shops including Budgens and Sainsbury’s.

Then, with the help of a team of volunteers, it serves meals on a pay-what-you-feel system on Friday lunchtimes.

Due to the flexible prices of meals, the café serves people of all economic backgrounds.

In a statement FoodCycle said: “The atmosphere has been lively, and it's not uncommon for a group of toddlers to be dancing to live piano music while mothers try to get them to finish their meals! 

“We hope it has provided a welcoming and friendly environment for all that have had a chance to visit us.”

Steven Hawkes, communications and fundraising officer for the charity, explained: “As a result of the difficult economic times that are being felt especially hard by local community groups and charities, we are unfortunately finding that we can no longer run the cafe on its current model.

“It is a real shame and it will be really missed but the lack of funding for positive social activities and rising operational costs means that we are no longer able to sustain the operations at the cafe going into 2013.”

FoodCycle will continue to run its 14 other cafes across the country, including four others in London.

Mr Hawkes said: “We are extremely grateful for all of the help from our dedicated volunteers at Station House and we would invite all interested parties to get in touch with us if they would like to volunteer at one of our London Hubs.

“We also still have our contacts with supermarkets for surplus food, volunteers and customers in the North London area so we would encourage any existing cafes or volunteers who would like us to share these contacts with them, to get in touch.”