Downpatrick Resource Centre is a day support service for adults over the age of 18 with long-term mental health needs, as well as their carers and relatives.

The aim of the service is to adopt a strengths-based approach in order to maximise service users’ independence, choice and control. Inclusion and involvement are the key aspects of our service. That means our service users are included in the decision-making processes within the centre and also encouraged to get involved in our local communities.

We have worked with FoodCloud since 2017 with food, seeds, plants and flowers donated from Lidl. These have greatly benefited our service users and our groups within the centre (Gardening, cookery, walking group and flower arranging). It has also given our service users the opportunity to try foods from all around the world. Our cookery group has shown our service users how to prepare and cook meals using the great variety of foods we have received. Our gardening group has also benefited from using the seed, plants and foods for compost as well so nothing goes to waste. Our flower arranging group has benefitted from the bunches of flowers donated to us over the past 7 years. The cookery group has been learning how to cook foods from different countries. Even our walking group has benefitted from water supplied by Lidl!