vybey and Mary's Meals

One of our proudest aspects of the vybey brand is our commitment to doing things properly. Whether this is in ensuring our meal-shakes contain nutritional wholeness and health benefits, our commitment to providing a great tasting and inexpensive product or our transparency through newsletters, we strive to perform at the top of our game.

When it came to picking a partner charity, something we had known from the start we would do, we wanted to ensure that our choice would reflect this decision. We wanted to pick a charity that not only succeeded in its basic mission, but also went beyond that in empowering and motivating others.

World hunger is becoming an ever-present issue within society as 811 million people still go hungry, despite enough food being produced globally. Due to many factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change, overall hunger numbers rose by over 150 million, in the year 2019 to 2020¹. 

Therefore, it is important to promote and work towards solving this global issue, as no one should go hungry. 

Mary’s Meals²

Mary’s Meals is an organisation that helps provide nutritional food access to some of the poorest communities. They currently work in 18 different countries globally, including countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe, feeding over 2 million children a day. 

They achieve this through their school feeding project, where they provide meals to children whose education may be hampered by hunger. By providing meals within places of education, Mary’s Meals make education more accessible to those who might not otherwise be able to go, while ensuring that the children are able to concentrate fully without worry about hunger or their next meal - providing them the opportunity to learn and grow. As an organisation, they prioritise serving food that the children are familiar with and that avoids cultural insensitivities such as not providing halal foodstuffs when necessary.

Mary’s Meals take donations, in all sizes, through their website and use the money to fuel their initiative. They also benefit from the size of their operations, through economies of scale, while retaining the ethos of a smaller, on-the-ground charity. For example, it costs Mary’s Meals approx £35 to feed a child for a whole school year! 

Mary’s Meals also aim to provide other essential items such as clothes and other tangible goods for immediate donation throughout their locations. Utilising a mixture of fundraising drives, active challenges (for example a sponsored mountain climb) and hosting some charity shops, Mary’s Meals have diversified their fundraising techniques giving them more stability as a charity and, ergo, greater consistency in providing the great work they do.

vybey x Mary’s Meals

Our work is continuing to make an impact. In 2020 we helped to donate over 1000 meals through Mary’s Meals – a number we are very proud of. 

One of our founders, Gordon, had this to say: 

"Giving back to disadvantaged communities is a cornerstone of the vybey mission. We knew from the start that vybey would be a movement that could help our customers reach their lifestyle goals alongside helping solve issues of hunger and nutritional access across the world.

Having founded a not-for-profit before vybey and seeing first hand the difference charitable efforts can make for disadvantaged members of the community, it was a no brainer for us to build vybey on social purpose foundations.

I came across Mary's Meals via my own mother as she used to attend school with the Founder. After due diligence and interviews, we knew straight away this was the charity we would like to support.

For example, Mary's Meals doesn’t just give out meals, they only provide these meals in a place of education. Therefore, the child must go to school and develop in order to receive the meals. With the hope that the education provides an increased chance of improving the future prospects for the child’s life.

As our brand grows and reaches more people, we will be able to feed more children through Mary’s Meals and engage in our own social foundation. In addition, we are exploring environmental charitable partners to align with our sustainability goals."

We will continue to support Mary’s Meals with our backed commitment of one meal donated for every online order through our website. So, next time you are sitting back and enjoying a vybey, know that you are not the only one enjoying a filling, nutritiously complete meal.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, it means a lot to us!

If you have any questions regarding Mary’s Meals or our partnership with them, simply drop us a line on hello@vybey.co.uk

1 Action Against Hunger, 2022. World Hunger: Key Facts and Statistics: https://www.actionagainsthunger.org/world-hunger-facts-statistics

2 Mary’s Meals, 2021. A Simple Solution to World Hunger: https://marysmglobal.org/