Partner Article

Growing start for healthy food enterprise

An entrepreneurial mum is helping to give hundreds of schoolchildren a healthy start by launching a fruit and vegetable delivery service.

The ironically-named Barbara Chrisp, dubbed the “Jamie Oliver of the North East” started The Cabbage Patch, to supply fresh produce and healthy eating advice to children’s centres and other community groups.

The 41-year-old was forced into a change of career when she was made redundant after eight years working for Sunderland-based finance firm CitiGroup.

Barbara grows a lot of her produce in gardens at her home in Wingate, and also orders stock from suppliers.

She said: “Finance was all I really knew for the past 20 years and it was a real shock when I lost my job.

“I’ve been growing my own produce for a few years and it was something I really enjoyed. You hear a lot of things about people in the Easington area not eating a great deal of fruit and vegetables.

“Easington is generally a low income area, fresh produce isn’t perceived as being cheap and I want people to see it as something affordable.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .