It’s hard to think of anything other than war at the moment- I wake thinking about it. It’s peppered most conversations, each news bulletin, every paper. The warehouse next to our bakery has become a local donation hub…every day people come to leave toothbrushes, thermals, nappies. All those small items that we take for granted, barely think about. Over a million refugees have crossed the border out of Ukraine now, mostly women (some of them pregnant) and children. Seeing images of women forced to shelter their children in bunkers or give birth in underground stations. The strength and resilience needed just to survive is unimaginable. And yet here we are. 

The shock of it hangs heavy. As does that niggling feeling of helplessness. Nothing we can do really feels enough does it? So, in the face of not knowing what more we can do we’re using today’s International Women’s Day to donate 20% from all our sales to Women For Women International- an organisation that specifically helps women affected by war and conflict. Because women really do bear the heaviest burden of violence, poverty and inequality caused by war. Buying from a female owned business today and choosing to support women’s charities couldn’t be more urgent. And even though we’re all thinking about more than marshmallows at the moment all our small spending decisions have a bigger impact- they drive social change globally, whether that’s giving women in developing countries the ability to be financially independent, or the ability of women closer to home to forge new ways of working. So thank you for supporting us this year and let’s hope that by next International Women’s Day we see more peace, stability and, most of all, equality.