Teams4U are sending lorry loads of items to the Poland/Ukraine border following the generosity of the Wrexham community.

The past week has been busy for the charity who have been helping with the local collection of items to send to Ukrainian refugees who have crossed the border into Poland.

Simon Cooke from Teams4U, who are known locally for their shoebox appeals, got in touch with Anna Buckley from the Polish Integration Support Centre last Monday after he saw their appeal on Facebook which was calling for donations.

Since then, Teams4U had to ask that donations stop being brought to them when they ran out of space and needed volunteers to help get the items ready to be put onto lorries.

 

@wrexhamcookie Story so far of the #Ukraine appeal in #Wrexham with the #Polish community and #Teams4U ♬ This Is The Life - Amy Macdonald

The first lorry went out Tuesday, March 8 and will take around three to four days to reach the Poland/Ukraine border.

However, the warehouse is still full.

Simon said: “It’s been great. The polish community really took it on and started it and then I think social media took over a little bit.

“Wrexham’s amazing. When people need to pull together, it’s amazing.”

The work the community has put into helping the refugees has touched Simon.

He recalls: “We had one boy, a young teenager, came in with four footballs because that’s what he had. He’d taken them from his garden and wanted to give them to kids in Ukraine.”

The effort has paid off and Simon says they have had a lot of work to get the donations on the road. PISC did not anticipate the support the community would give, but Simon said he knew.

Here is the moment that the first lorry left Teams4U to head to Poland:

He added: “It’s been a very challenging week but it's been brilliant to see the good in people which comes as a polar opposite to horrible situation that’s happening.

“It’s £7.50 to feed a family for a week. The amount of people who go ‘that’s something I can do’ but then when we said the warehouse is full, we need people to sort it, we were inundated. Its great to see people coming together and helping in any way they can because it's such a horrible situation.”

There’s at least another lorry needed to clear the warehouse, however, Teams4U will be taking donations to be sent to the Romainian border once the Polish load has gone.

All updates on the work of Teams4U will appear on their website and on Facebook.