We now have a Planet Aid UK clothing bank in the car park at The Bridge. Planet Aid UK has collected clothes from around 260 clothing banks for many years in the area from Bristol in the north to Cornwall in the Southwest as well as being present in East Anglia, Yorkshire, East Midlands and North London. They have a depot in Cullompton where a good team of 3 drivers make sure all banks are emptied at least every fortnight.

We are pleased to support their main objective: How we can act to minimise Climate Change, the biggest challenge for Humanity today. 10% of ALL CO2 emission comes from producing new clothes. When we replace 1kg of new clothes with second-hand clothes we cut the CO2 by 6kg so please come and help.

The pizza oven is now fully repaired and we had our first evening last week which was a great success. We are endeavouring to offer pizzas most Fridays but please contact us in advance to make sure. There will be alternative suppers when not baking pizzas.

We have a carers meeting once a month where we offer tea, coffee and a space for carers to meet, exchange ideas and companionship. Carers meet 2pm on the 4th Wednesday of the month (Somerset Carers Well Being South Somerset) No need to book, just turn up

Harriet and Charlie – two local independent florists deliver beautiful bouquets of locally grown flowers each week for you to buy from them

Plotgate deliver their weekly veg boxes for collection – contact Plotgate directly to sign up, you won’t be disappointed!

We are currently showing a fabulous art display by Ally McGinn who is a local Autistic Artist and has generated an enormous amount of praise. We are hoping she will do an ‘art in action’ slot soon where she can work and discuss what she does in a forum that suits her better than a stand up talk.

Last month we had an outside ‘stall’ to accommodate 70 cyclists on a charity bike ride so that we could cater for them without it impinging on a normal busy Saturday. It was such a success, we will certainly consider a ‘fast track’ coffee stop during the summer months to help with the queuing at busy times at the weekend.

We’ve been nominated for The South West Tourism Excellence award with the award ceremony at The Eden Project on March 23rd, so that should be a bit of fun. We’ll be open again on Friday evenings with a pizza night on 14th April (when it if is a bit warmer hopefully) so watch this space…

We won gold for the top cafe/tearoom of the year in the Bristol, Bath and Somerset Tourism Awards. Many thanks to all our customers and staff for getting us there.

Have you noticed the new paved area underneath the shelter? Hopefully the outside seating should now be more accessible in the wet weather!

Talking of which, we have now stopped our Friday evenings of pizzas and suppers which will return when the clocks change again next Spring.

But we do now have a new very whizzy milkshake maker
– so pop in and try it!

We’ve signed up to The Living Wage Foundation so that all staff are guaranteed the living not just the minimum wage…