Waitrose is set to stock its shelves with carrots and potatoes that have been grown in classrooms all around the country. The national scheme has been rolled out with the backing of celebrity gardener Alan Titchmarsh. The supermarket’s new ‘grow and sell’ initiative is trying to encourage a new generation of young people to get involved in growing fruit and vegetables. Focussing on 7- to 11-year-olds across the UK, they will be helping them grow and sell their own produce.
Every single branch of Waitrose across the UK will team up with four local primary schools who will each receive a seed kit. The kit is designed to get the schools’ vegetable patches up and running, and includes an assortment seeds, equipment and step-by-step instructions for growing the crops. Later in the summer, the branches will invite the schools to sell the produce that they grow outside the store.
Another aspect of the scheme is that schools will be able to receive additional seed kits’ in the Waitrose stores with the Waitrose community matters scheme, where customers can support a local charity by dropping a green token into a box. It is hoped that the scheme, which is being run in association with the Waitrose farm on the Leckford Estate, will reach out to over 100,000 children and help to encourage an interest in gardening.
The national roll-out of the scheme comes after a successful pilot last year. 20 primary and secondary schools across London team up with ten Waitrose branches in conjunction with the School Food Matters charity to sell fruit, vegetables, eggs, chutneys and jams.
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