The Childcare & Community Centres calls out for votes to get a share of Tesco’s Stronger Starts fund

The Childcare & Community Centres is bidding for a cash boost from the Tesco Stronger Starts scheme.

Stronger Starts provides grant awards of up to £1,500 to local community projects, with a particular focus on children and young people.

Three groups in every community have been shortlisted to receive grant awards and Tesco customers can vote for the group they think should take away the top award in their local Tesco store.

The Childcare & Community Centres is one of the groups on the shortlist in Wigan.

2701 Hindley Extra WN2 3AT

5081 Ashton-In-Makerfield Esso Express Express WN4 8PF

5323 Hindley Green Express WN2 4SQ

5387 Wigan Poolstock Lane Express Express WN3 5JE

Since the increase of Government funding for working parents, we have seen a rise in the number of children starting at nursery. September and January saw a large number of children all starting within the same week. As you can imagine many of the children needed lots of support to settle into nursery life.

Children struggle with the change of environment from home to nursery and we wish to adapt our environment to make children feel more at home and comfortable in their new world.

We have researched the Danish term “Hygge” which means relax. They follow some basic rules when creating their living environment, they are calm, have gentle lighting, relaxing music, soft furnishings and inviting aromas. We wish to incorporate aspects of “Hygge” into the nursery environment with the sole purpose of improving the well-being of children and staff.

We would like Tesco customers to vote for us so we can create a safe and cosy space within each of our three nursery rooms were children can retreat to either be by themselves or with a teacher to cosy up and read a book or listen to music. It is proven that this will help to settle children into nursery life much faster and for them to feel secure and safe.

“We cannot wait to use our blue tokens from January, the children at nursery love voting with their tokens”

Voting is open in all Tesco stores from mid-January 2026 until 31st March 2026. Customers will cast their vote using a blue token given to them at the check-out each time they shop.

Tesco’s Stronger Starts – previously known as Tesco Bags of Help and Tesco Community Grants – has already provided over £127 million to more than 74,000 projects across Britain.

This £5m Stronger Starts grant programme, delivered in partnership with charity Groundwork, helps schools and children’s groups provide nutritious food and healthy activities that support young people’s physical health and mental wellbeing, such as breakfast clubs or snacks, and sports equipment for after school clubs.

Claire de Silva, Tesco UK Head of Communities and Local Media, said: “Helping schools and children’s groups access the food and resources they need is vitally important in getting children a stronger start in life. Children with enough food have more energy, better concentration, and ultimately achieve more too.”

Graham Duxbury, Groundwork’s UK Chief Executive, said: “As a community charity, we have seen first-hand how schools and other groups supporting young people have been playing a much bigger role in ensuring children are getting a healthy start to the day and getting access to spaces and services to support physical activity and mental health. Family budgets are tight and school budgets are tight, but it’s so important that children stay fed, fit and focused, so we’re delighted to be able to prioritise these activities alongside Tesco with the Stronger Starts programme.”

Funding is available to community groups and charities looking to fund local projects that bring benefits to communities, particularly those helping to provide food and giving children the support they need for a good start in life.

Anyone can nominate a project and organisations can apply online. To find out more visit tescoplc.com/strongerstarts

For further information please contact: sue.benson@cccad.co.uk