OMA May 2025 Updates
Dear OMA community
Writing to you straight out of pause week - I hope you've all enjoyed the chance to relax and refresh before what promises to be a VERY busy week ahead.
What's more - I bring lots of good news in this newsletter! Whilst both our stock levels and finances were troubling last week, the hall is nice and full - and so are our accounts! Thanks to everyone who donated to our crowdfunder last month, meaning we smashed our 10k target. I also got news this morning that the National Lottery Awards for All approved our grant for £20,000 - which should give us lots of time to start getting GiftAid and Charity grant money in (more on that later).
Whether you're a recipient, volunteer, donor, or are just someone who likes to keep up with OMA's work - we're so grateful for everything everyone puts in to keep this amazing community running. We're coming up to 5 years of operation in August - the fact a grassroots organisation, founded by working class activists has blossomed into something so amazing is why i'm so proud to be a part of OMA - and i'm sure you all are too!
CIO Application is APPROVED
After an incredibly long and difficult process, are application to be a charity is APPROVED!!! Our charity number is 1213202, and you can see our official page on the CC website here!
This will of course be amazing for our fundraising opportunities - if you have any ideas for programmes/schemes we should get signed up with and involved now that we're a charity please let me know!
Close Week & Understanding our service
As you will likely know, OMA has been shut for the past week to allow staff to take off Annnual Leave/TOIL that has been piling up!
It's also given Frayer the chance to get in touch with all 130 of our long-term regulars (not counting the 50 new regs!), talk with them and better support their needs - it was great to get feedback on how important the work OMA does in providing regular, reliable support to people struggling in all sorts of ways - very many of whom are carers, have long term health issues, and are struggling financially.
Meanwhile, stats whiz Maria will be looking into our EP service, evaluating the ways it is used (IE - how many people request every ten days over a few months vs request once a month over the years). Pause week is giving us the chance to collect all this data, really understand how and why people use our service so we can update how OMA functions and ensure the service we provide is fit for purpose and is helping as many people as possible - watch out for more updates on this in the future!
OMA SOCIAL
We'll be holding our regular OMA social at the Rusty Bicycle on Magdalen Road at 7pm! Would love to see as many of you as possible there! This will be an opportunity to celebrate our CIO success and say goodbye to Chris L :((
From one extreme to the other - pre close week stocks were extremely low, but stocks are incredibly full this week following lots of huge deliveries on friday and throughout the week - extra big parcels will hopefully continue to meet the huge demand we've been seeing - rapidly approaching the 2500 mark of unique households we've helped over the years!
BECOME A REGULAR SUPPORTER OF OMA
Did you know - we have over 250 amazing people who support us every month with a regular, monthly donation, giving between £5 to over £100 each month!
These regular donors are so, so key to keeping us going - as fundraising decreases across the charity sector and more and more charities are cutting back, we're so grateful for all our regular donors for supporting the work we do.
Being a regular donor means you're giving OMA the stability to plan for its future, boosting our income to match rising cost of living - if you thinnk you can step up today to support us, please do so below - every penny counts!
VOlunteer spotlight
A massive thank you to everyone has stepped up and gone above and beyond this month - if you're interested in helping out more- be this through pickup/delivery, or other special skills, we want to hear from you!
Our superstar volunteer of the month this April is Kevin! Kevin has been super helpful, taking on a lot of talks at schools as part of our school fundraising push, teaching kids about what OMA does and what can be done about food insecurity.
Kevin has also stepped up to become an onboarder - part of our team that introduces new volunteers to OMA, helps them get settled and trained up to start helping out! This is of course super important work, so massive thanks to Kevi!!
If you're looking to help out on the admin side of things at OMA, we still need ONE more onboarder to complete the team - so get in contact at volunteering@oxfordmutualaid.org
NEWS
School Talks!
A huge thank you to David J, Celeste and Kevin, who've been an amazing school talks team - visiting three schools this month and three schools next month, where we'll be arranging quid and a can fundraisers.
If you work at a school or have a child in attendance at a local school and would like to get OMA involved, give us a shout! Education regarding mutual aid and food poverty is now a part of our official charitable objectives, so we're keen to visit as many schools as possible to talk about our work.
Summer Festivals
We're also keen to be at as many festivals this summer as possible, giving people the chance to learn about our work and get involved - if you're able to help out or have some ideas for fairs we should be in attendance at, give me a shout.
We'll be at Oxford DIY Pride on June 15th, so hope to see as many as possible of you there!
Help Needed
New Hall Leads
We are also in need of some more hall leads - If you’re a current hall vol this is a super flexible role. We have someone on hand online /on call from the staff team at all times to help if needed, and we’re more than happy for people to hall lead in a pair if they prefer!
if you have a few months of volunteering in hall and would like to step up to help out here, please reach out! The role essentially means you just keep an eye on the whatsapp, help find tasks for other vols to do, and pack protein and chill (which we’d still train you in ofc)!
This would be a huge help if people are able to step up - we really only have 1 regular non-staff hall lead so it makes scheduling quite difficult - so any time slots/hours or contributions, no matter how small, are welcome :)
Get in touch via whatsapp or volunteering@oxfordmutualaid.org if you are interested in helping!
New Trainers/Onbarders
We need just one person in each of these categories, so if you're able to be the one who steps up, it will be a huge help!
We need another hall trainer to bring the training team up to four people. This is a fortnightly task on a monday/wednesday, where you're help train up a new small batch of new hall volunteers on how to pack parcels. This is of course key to OMA, bringing in new people to keep us running, and a super oppurtunity to be the first friendly face that introduces someone to the community. Of course, full training is provided and shadowing is available before you fully start!
And, reiterating the call from earlier - for those looking for an admin role at OMA, we need one more onboarder in the oboarding team - this is someone who just has to call and email any new signups we get, have a chat with them and make sure they're handed over to the right team/training to induct them into OMA!
Again, get in touch via whatsapp or at volunteering@oxfordmutualaid.org if you are interested in helping!
New Freezers
Finally, a callout for any donations of second-had FREEZERS you may have. As i'm sure you've noticed, the door of Fridge 8 has fully stopped trying and fell clean off, so we're keen to get a replacement in ASAP, as freezers are constantly full!. we're particularly missing Freddie and Eddie, both of whom have broken down again, so soon after getting them repaired - whilst we're looking at getting them repaired again, it would be good to know if any other options for help are out there.
So, if you have a spare old freezer in your garage, are getting a new freezer, or know of any businesses/restaurants that are getting new stock in or have old freezers that can be donated, please, please get in touch!
That's all for this month! Hoping to bring lots of good news to you next month (fingers crossed) - it's needed more than ever right now.
Continue to look out for one another, in solidarity, support and community, and otherwise I/we will see you around the hall and beyond
Love and Solidarity - Alfie + The OMA Team.