Stork Support is our core service, giving free and low cost vital baby and household essentials to the most vulnerable families such as those fleeing DV, living in temporary accommodation, living on extremely low incomes and those with poor mental health. We make sure parents don’t have to choose between clothing and feeding their children and paying their bills, by giving them peace of mind with the provision of baby essentials, exactly when they need them.
We take referrals from professionals in the NHS and local authorities such as Midwives, Health Visitors, Outreach workers, Early Help teams, Social workers and other charity professionals. We now operate collection hubs for most of our clients, where families can access wraparound support when they go to collect their items (nappies, wipes, toiletries and vouchers for baby food such as first stage infant formula). Every package is tailored to a family’s needs – and may also include toys, clothes or pieces of equipment when needed.
We now work across Manchester and Salford with partners such as Sure Start and Family Hubs to provide ‘collection hubs’ for Stork Support clients on specific days of the week. Working with partners across Manchester ensures we can offer wraparound support to our most vulnerable families through Outreach teams and specialist services. Anywhere not currently serviced by a hub still get a delivery from our volunteers, or get sent an e-voucher to go and buy the items.
Clients in the above postcodes will be contacted by Claire on a Tuesday, letting them know where and when to collect their parcel. Please let families know this, and if they won’t be able to pick up for any reason, we expect a response from the client or the referrer to arrange alternative pickups.Â
We can only provide essentials to families with city of Manchester or Salford postcodes. PLEASE NOTE: We are NOT accepting repeat referrals for anyone within one calendar month from when the last referral was processed by us, which may not be the same date the referral was received.
Please fill in the form below (press on the small arrow on the right hand side if you can’t see all of it) and press submit – it will say ‘thank you your response is recorded’. You can choose to have your responses sent to you – please check the box and this will be sent automatically.Â
We now process referrals on a Tuesday from 12pm and clients will be A) asked to pickup from their local hub or B) a volunteer will deliver to them between Wednesday and Sunday or C) an E-voucher will be sent to them if no volunteer if available.Â
We only store data for the purposes of delivering packages and contacting clients for this project, and will never give any information to a third party without the client’s permission (even for signposting etc). We need as much information as possible from referrers to ensure we can support the client quickly.
BOOBS empowers women in Salford and Bury to be open about their breastfeeding experiences and inspire others to breastfeed for longer.
Stork Store is our online and physical store, selling pre-loved and new toys, as well as baby clothes, nappies and more at discounted prices
Stork Boost is a short 5 week course aimed at helping parents to get back into the job market as well as gain a better understanding of the benefits system, accessing childcare funding, and more.
We are not accepting self-referrals at this time. We accept any referrals from a professional; a Health Visitor, social worker, support worker, outreach teams, children centre/Early Help teams, midwives, other charities such as Homestart or Citizens Advice or foodbanks. If you need help with baby essentials, please speak to them. Â
If you don’t have a contact such as these, please find your nearest Family Hub (Salford) or Sure Start Centre (Manchester) and ask the team to make a referral.Â
We have been funded to provide the following items:
There are times when we can also provide the following items, subject to availability:
Yes, but we ask for a referral to be sent to us each time from a professional, as we have limited funds and we want to make sure items get to the families most in need.
There are situations where we will prioritise families for repeat referrals – such as those with no recourse to public funds, living in temporary accommodation or fleeing domestic violence. Please speak to us about the reasons for needing repeat deliveries.
We are unable to accept repeat referrals within one calendar month.
Sorry, we cannot guarantee any specific brands.
Anyone receiving a delivery from a volunteer will receive nappies from a shop of the volunteer’s choosing – normally a supermarket.
We have limited stocks of clothing available for newborn to 8 years+ but these are not guaranteed. We also have toys and sometimes have equipment such as Moses baskets and baths etc.
Families are welcome to visit our Stork Store community hub on a Wednesday or Thursday morning at Emmanuel Centre, 174 Langworthy Road, M6 5PN. We are open 10 am to 1pm and have clothes available from 50p. We also have a free items section including School uniform.Â
We have a Stork Store School Uniforms and clothes rail inside Little Hulton Family hub available for free Monday-Friday.Â
You can also visit Salford Step Into Action in Walkden who have a shop full of equipment and other items.
For newborns, Early Essentials, Baby Basics and Salford Baby bank all provide Moses Baskets / Clothes / other items through a referral service.
Please make a referral through our form below
Please include all information requested (nappy sizes are very important!!) as without this information the referral can be delayed.
If you are requesting extra items such as clothes or want to speak to us about a particular family, please email laura@visitfromthestork.co.uk (our Project officer) with the details and your phone number so we can call you back if needed. You’re welcome to copy in claire@visitfromthestork.co.uk
We are NOT able to accept requests for repeat referrals within one calendar month.
We are open for referrals all week, but we now process referrals on a Wednesday afternoon at 12 pm. The list of referrals sent before this time gets sent to our team of volunteers and they then deliver the items to the clients between Wednesday evening and Sunday.
As we are a very small team, this now means referrals sent in on Thursday and Fridays do not get processed until Wednesday and it may take up to a week for the items to be delivered – as we are no longer working in ’emergency’ mode.
Please note we can’t guarantee urgent deliveries of items but please speak to us if the need is urgent (for example for a very vulnerable family or new mum).
Call Claire on 07840399360 for urgent requests only and we will do our best to help.
If you/clients live in an area where we are running a hub (currently M40, M30, M9 4, M5, M6, M7, M8, M9, M11, M18 and M19)
), once we receive a referral it will be processed through a secure system and sent to the Hub teams. You will receive a text message to say where to pick the items up from.Â
All other areas;Â
Once we receive a referral with all the correct information, we process the information on our secure system. We send the jobs to our volunteers via Whatsapp. They go to the shops to buy the items and take them to the client.Â
We are currently funded by The National Lottery Cost of Living Fund, Salford CVS and The Trusthouse Foundation as well as sales of toys, clothes and subsidised baby essentials in our shop and donations.Â
Yes! You can make a monetary donation to our project via Square – our payment processing system hereÂ
Or visit our general donation page where you can find information about donating both money and items.
or via BACS – please email us finance@visitfromthestork.co.uk to ask for our bank details to donate via bank transfer.
Please make a referral through our form below.
Please include all information requested (nappy sizes are very important!!) as without this information the referral can be delayed.
If you are requesting extra items such as clothes or want to speak to us about a particular family, please put details in the notes and email laura@visitfromthestork.co.uk (our Project officer) with the details and your phone number so we can call you back if needed. You’re welcome to copy in claire@visitfromthestork.co.uk
We are NOT able to accept requests for repeat referrals within one calendar month.
We are open for referrals all week, but we now process referrals on a Wednesday afternoon at 12 pm. The list of referrals sent before this time gets processed by Claire and then either sent to our hub teams / partners or to our team of volunteers. Any clients living in Moston or parts of Salford will now collect their items on a Thursday from a hub. All other areas at the moment will have a volunteer deliver to them between Wednesday evening and Sunday OR an e-voucher sent to them by Claire if no volunteer is available.Â
As we are a very small team, this now means referrals sent in on Thursday and Fridays do not get processed until Wednesday and it may take up to a week for the items to be delivered/collected – as we are no longer working in ’emergency’ mode.
Please note we can’t guarantee urgent deliveries of items but please speak to us if the need is urgent (for example for a very vulnerable family or new mum).
Call Claire on 07840399360 or Laura on 07842546235 for urgent requests only and we will do our best to help.