A coffee shop housed in a local cancer treatment centre has donated its entire post-lockdown profits of £4,961 to Rosemere Cancer Foundation.

The volunteer-managed coffee shop within Fulwood’s Rosemere Cancer Centre, which first opened in 2002 to support the charity by serving refreshments to patients, carers and cancer centre staff, went into lockdown ahead of the UK by three weeks in March 2020.

It opened in October last year with reduced service and menus. The donation represents its financial year profits – from October 2021 to the end of March 2022.

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Dan Hill, the chief officer of Rosemere Cancer Foundation, said: “This latest donation has come as a lovely surprise. It’s amazing. The coffee shop had to close to protect patients with compromised immune systems.

“We had people telling us how much it was missed all the time, but there was nothing we could do until Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which manages the cancer centre, felt it was safe for our volunteers to
re-open.”

Since 2002, the coffee shop has gifted over £300,000 in profits and donations to its collection boxes to Rosemere Cancer Foundation.

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Dan said: “Our coffee shop volunteers are a wonderful team. Many are former patients themselves and know their service has as much to do with the kindness, compassion and support they show for patients, carers and staff as the food and drink they serve.

“The disruption of the pandemic has led to several volunteers not returning. The team requires more people to get the coffee shop back up to full speed. Anyone interested in volunteering can contact us initially.”

Rosemere Cancer Foundation works to bring cancer treatments and services to cancer patients treated at Rosemere Cancer Centre. It is the specialist cancer treatment and radiotherapy centre at the Royal Preston Hospital.

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The charity funds equipment, research, training and other cancer services and therapies that the NHS cannot afford to make cancer journeys effective, comfortable and stress-free.

For more information, visit – www.rosemere.org.uk

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