Cost of Living Crisis: A Letter from our CEO

In this blog, Rachel Medina, CEO at the Snowdrop Project, delves into the Cost of Living crisis, and the impact of this on both Snowdrop and the wider charity sector.

"The cost of living - we’ve all been hearing about it since late 2021, and probably feeling it in our household budgets, too. The cost of living crisis has profoundly affected both the charity sector and Snowdrop. I wanted to share more about this with our community of supporters, so that you can gain a sense of what’s happening at Snowdrop and across the charity sector more widely. It’s a long one, but I hope you find it informative and honest.  

How did it start?

In autumn 2021, the UK saw inflation start to rise, which was then exacerbated by a number of different factors, including: 

• Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, affecting fuel and grain prices (1)
• Liz Truss’ mini-budget, which had a profound impact on overall inflation (2)
• The UK leaving the single market at the end of 2020, which meant that supply chains were more volatile and less resilient (3)

As a result, inflation rose sharply in early 2022, peaking at 11.1% in October 2024 (4). In an effort to cool the economy and control inflation, the Bank of England raised interest rates from 1% in May 2022, to 5.25% in August 2023, where it remained until September 2024 (5). This approach was successful, and, by July 2024, inflation was down to the target of 2% (6).

Although inflation is down overall, we, as consumers, still see the lasting impact on costs, particularly for food. Food inflation peaked at 19.2% in March 2023, and whilst food inflation is now reducing steadily, it remains higher than the overall rate of inflation (7). 

In fact, according to the Food Foundation’s weekly price tracker, since April 2022, food prices have increased by 23% and 26% for women’s and men’s shopping baskets respectively (8). Our clients have been hit particularly hard by this, as most are still on incredibly low incomes. In the year 2023/24, we made over 50 referrals to local food banks. 

How has this impacted charities?  

The impact of this on the charity sector as a whole has been profound (9).  

Charities are experiencing:  

• Increased demand for services
• A reduction in giving – people have less disposable income to give, and are less likely to take part in fundraising events
• Increase in costs overall, including staffing, utilities, goods and services
• Increased competition for funding from grants and foundation trusts, with grant makers receiving record numbers of applications  
• Grants which rarely increase with inflation, meaning they do not go as far as they did just two years ago
• Recruitment and retention difficulties - charities are having difficulty recruiting skilled workers and keeping staff who would benefit from higher wages in other sectors or at larger charities

"Staffing is emerging as a major issue for many charities. Around half (53%) say they can afford their current staffing levels, while three in five (60%) are struggling to recruit or retain suitably qualified candidates or volunteers. 70% of charities now say that the rising cost of living is affecting their workforce, compared to 53% at the start of the year." – Charities Aid Foundation (10)

What about at Snowdrop? 

At Snowdrop, we have been impacted by this in a few ways:  

Increase in demand for services 

Like many other charities, we have seen a significant increase in demand for our services, and the number of both adults and children we have worked with has been increasing year-on-year since 2021.  

*approximate figures 

In addition, whilst we have always had a waiting list for our Counselling service, we've seen an increase in the number of referrals we're receiving. In 2024 so far, we've had over 80 referrals, and therefore our waiting list has expanded. In Casework, we now have a waiting list for the first time; throughout this year, there have been 6-10 survivors waiting to access Casework support at any one time. To mitigate this, we have opened a Drop-in Service on a Tuesday morning, to ensure that those waiting to access Casework support are still able to get their most urgent needs addressed.  

Impact on fundraising

We have seen increased competition for grant funding across the board. We are always incredibly grateful for our grant funders; however, with increasing costs, we are in the position of having to raise more money just to maintain our current position.  

This year, we have seen an uptick in community fundraising, and have been generously supported through partnerships with both community organisations and universities. Our 2024 Kilimanjaro Trek was a big success, and our amazing group of fundraisers worked so hard to reach their goal and raise over £66,000 for survivors of modern slavery. They pushed themselves to the limit during the trip, and worked so hard for every penny that came in. You can read more about the trek itself here. We’re so grateful for all our incredible fundraisers – we couldn’t do what we do without you.  

Staff recruitment and retention 

This is one of the more significant ways that we have been affected. Due to the fundraising climate, our income and overall staffing levels have shrunk in real terms since 2021/22. Through careful budgeting, we have managed to avoid redundancies and protect the services we are offering. 

However, we have not been able to replace roles when staff have left, and we have struggled to recruit skilled staff for vacant roles. This means that the existing team are working over capacity for longer. This impacts our ability to plan for the future from a staffing, infrastructure and income perspective.  

Overall costs

Like many businesses, organisations and, well, everyone, our costs have been impacted significantly by the cost of living crisis.  

We have reduced our spending to the bone over the last three years, and cut some things we wish we didn’t have to, in order to protect core services.  

For example, we have had to make the difficult decision to reduce our community budget by 60%, meaning that we can no longer commit to consistent English classes (although other organisations have kindly stepped in to keep this up). We've also had to stop universally reimbursing our clients' travel to Snowdrop, which has meant that some of our clients are rationing their travel into the city centre. Some clients, for example, are choosing to spend on transport to attend their Counselling sessions, but this means they're missing out on vital opportunities through our Community programme. Our staff also went without pay rises across the organisation in the financial year 2022/23. These are the headlines, but they are not the only things to go in order to balance the budget. 

We have also seen our costs increase:  

• 127% increase in utilities costs, (electricity, heating, water etc.) 
• 31% increase in interpreter costs for Casework and Counselling appointments 
• 66% increase in business fees and costs 
• 60% increase in bank charges 
• 43% average increase in overall costs 

Taking all this together, we have been profoundly affected by the cost of living crisis over the last four years. We have had to make difficult decisions that have affected clients and staff. We have adapted as much as possible to preserve and prioritise our service delivery, and, despite the challenges, we have continued to increase our impact year-on-year as well.   

Overall, like many charities, we are doing more with less, running on the goodwill of our expert, committed and passionate staff.  

For our team, this has meant working harder on all fronts, just to keep Snowdrop in the same position and protect cuts to vital services.  

We have also shown incredible adaptability, innovative thinking and creative ways of solving problems. We have established our Drop-in Service to ensure that clients on the Casework waiting list can still have their most urgent needs met. The Counselling team have made use of group sessions and alternative therapies to ensure clients are able to access some support while they wait for Counselling. Our Community Manager has done a lot with a little, and served more clients than ever before on fewer resources.  

This is what we do in the charity sector because the need is great. We have worked hard to ensure that we are able to continue serving our community in the years to come.  

We are so thankful for our community and supporters, whose generosity and faithfulness buoys and motivates us during these challenging times.

With warm wishes,

Rachel Medina, CEO, The Snowdrop Project"

If you have any questions about any of the above, please feel free to email us at info@snowdropproject.co.uk. If you would like to support the work Snowdrop does, please click here. 

1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021%E2%80%93present_United_Kingdom_cost-of-living_crisis (Accessed 09/10/2024)

2 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/63229204 (Accessed 09/10/2024)

3 https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/fruit-and-veg/post-brexit-supply-chains-contributing-to-food-shortages/676877.article (Accessed 09/10/2024)

4 https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/timeseries/d7g7/mm23 (Accessed 09/10/2024)

5 https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/boeapps/database/Bank-Rate.asp (Accessed 09/10/2024)

6 https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/timeseries/d7g7/mm23 (Accessed 09/10/2024)

7 https://foodfoundation.org.uk/initiatives/food-prices-tracking#tabs/Food-Price-Indices-Tracker (Accessed 09/10/2024)

8 https://foodfoundation.org.uk/initiatives/food-prices-tracking#tabs/Basic-Basket-Tracker/Weekly-Price-Changes (Accessed 09/10/2024)

9 https://www.charityexcellence.co.uk/charity-cost-of-living-crisis-funding-cuts-report/ (Accessed 09/10/2024)

10 https://www.cafonline.org/about-us/press-office/cost-of-living-charities-still-struggling-to-meet-demand-and-cover-costs (Accessed 09/10/2024)