Williams Refrigeration has donated a refrigeration cabinet, worth around £3,000, to the Steam House Café in King’s Lynn. Operated by regional charity Access Community Trust, the high street mental health and wellbeing hub offers holistic support, therapies and activities during the day and urgent assistance and appointments in the evening, including one-to-one counselling.
Georgina Clark, HR manager at Williams became aware of STEAM (Support, Transform, Eat and Educate, Aspire, Motivate) through her support work with staff. “Mental health has rightly been taken much more seriously in recent years,” she says. “I had heard about the Steam House Café and went along to see for myself what they offer. The café provides a brilliant service. It’s wonderful because as well as offering a walk-in service staffed by mental health support workers, the counselling takes place in a very relaxed, café style environment… which is where our fridge came in!”
From left to right: Stephanie Gaughran (Crisis café Host), Tom Middleton (Commercial & Customer Service Manager, Williams), Holly Bridges (Crisis Café service manager), Jonathan Lewis (Performance Improvement Manager, GEBE) and Georgina Clark (HR Manager, Williams)
Holly Bridges, the crisis café’s service manager at Kings Lynn, explains: “STEAM’s customer base has grown significantly since we opened our community mental health café,” she says. “It has become a beacon of hope for the growing number of local people who are facing wellbeing challenges.
“This welcome donation from Williams Refrigeration not only allows us to provide a greater range of food and drinks for those visiting us, it also shows that, as a local business, the company recognises the importance of the vital service the STEAM team provides.”
Apart from needing a bigger fridge, another problem the café had was a lack of space. “They needed more chilled storage, but they didn’t have a whole lot of room,” says Georgina. “Our team found the answer for them in the Jade J500U – it fits their bill perfectly! What’s more, our transport partner, GE-BE, agreed to deliver and install the fridge to the café for free, so big thanks to them as well!”
The Williams J500U is 1940mm tall, has a footprint of 727mm by 837mm and a big capacity of 523 litres. The model also has the refrigeration unit fitted under the cabinet rather than on top. This is great for kitchens with low ceilings, since top-mounted systems can overheat if there’s not enough room for them to ventilate. With an under-mounted system, there’s plenty of room for the air to circulate and the fridge to keep its cool.
The Steam House Café is a free to access mental health and wellbeing service that provides non-judgemental support at 102 High Street, King’s Lynn, daily from 11am. For more information visit steamhousecafes.co.uk, call 01553 401831 or pop in.