Braw Tea Community Cafe - Triathlon Fundraiser

Hello hello,

On June 10th I'll be completing the Slateman triathlon around the lovely (but slightly hilly) Snowdonia National Park in N Wales. The event will consist of a 1.5km swim in the brisk waters of Llyn Padarn, followed by a 50km cycle circumnavigating Mount Snowdon, and is topped off with a juicy 12km hill run up the old slate quarry.

That's the boring bit out the way, so here's the reason why I'm asking you to part with your pennies. Over the last 6 months my super mum has been hard at work setting up a community cafe to support disadvantaged and marginalised women in Dundee (alongside working full time I might add). The cafe, will be located in sunny Dundee, in Castle Green park, Broughty Ferry and is named "Braw Tea" (guess where I inherited my affinity for puns from).

Here's a bit about Braw Tea:

"Braw Tea Community Interest Company is a social enterprise with the ambition to support disadvantaged women in Dundee. It will do this through the creation of a community café in Broughty Ferry that will provide training and employment opportunities. The social enterprise will support the women to build confidence, self -esteem, reduce social isolation and stigma and will support the women to secure future employment and economic freedom through gaining relevant transferable workplace skills. Our name indicates that we will do ‘good’, offer good food and will be based in Broughty Ferry.

The beneficiary group will include:

- Women who face challenges through poverty, social isolation, poor educational attainment, mental health issues, domestic abuse, low risk women offenders, and refugee/asylum seekers. Referrals to the project will be made through working closely with identified third sector partners, the volunteer agencies and Dundee City Council Employability Team. This list is not exclusive, and we will work with any woman who may benefit from the support and training provided.

What will we do?

We will support women in Dundee and Tayside who are disadvantaged, by providing opportunities to enhance their life chances and to enable economic freedom through training and employment. The creation of a professional, yet community-run cafe with good food made from scratch that has social purpose will allow:

- skills enhancement leading to future employment/economic independence to enhance future life-choices

- self-esteem and teamwork

-reduction of social isolation and stigma

What difference will this make?

The theory of change is as follows:

- the women who participate in Braw Tea will develop self-confidence, resilience, transferable skills, experience and qualifications that they are able to use to support them to enhance their life-choices through positive destinations. This may include:

- going on to do further training at college or university

- to be less socially isolated and to continue to volunteer either with Braw Tea or with others and to go on to become mentors/trainers to other women

- to go on to employment opportunities to be economically independent"

So the long and short of it is that this is my small and rather self indulgent way of trying to support my mum, Braw Tea and all of the fantastic community good they seek to achieve. As a result any donations you're able to make would be greatly appreciated. The money will be used to procure kitchen equipment, furnishings, and most importantly ingredients for good food, cake and coffee.

For those wanting to find out more about Braw Tea you can do so by visiting the website here: http://brawtea.co.uk/

The cafe is looking to open its doors the very weekend I'm completing the triathlon (10/06/2023), so if you can't donate please feel free to come down and have a cuppa (or even better do both).

Thanks a bunch all and well done Mum, you've absolutely smashed it, very proud! Can't wait to see Braw Tea in full swing and all the good it will do for women around Dundee.

**Let me be clear in case it isn't in the above text, this is not a request for money to fund my mum's private cafe. Braw Tea is a Community Interest Company, which means 100% of any profits made are reinvested into the local community / business for public good.**