Trent Vineyard Church, Nottingham

 
The role of the hospitality team is to welcome our guests with a friendly face, a cup of tea or coffee and a slice or two of toast. We also help to provide for the needs of our visitors in terms of food and toiletries and we are eternally grateful to the various schools that have donated their harvest festival gifts and to the individuals and groups that give regularly. Without such unfailing generosity the hospitality team could not continue to impact so many people.

 
The great thing about this team is that you are able to visit people who have come to the Arches in their own homes. It is amazing how little some people have and it's great to be able to provide them with essentials like a sofa or a bed. We are able to deliver furniture to homes right across Nottingham with our trusty white van on Thursdays, Saturdays and now Tuesdays. We also collect donated furniture to bring back to the Arches. The team is a mix of drivers and co-pilots who are always ready to tackle the age-old wardrobe vs twisting staircase problem.

The Ark is a large storage capacity warehouse, away from the Arches site, which enables us to provide more furniture items to those in need.

The Arches is linked to the Ark via our web site- Arches Furniture on Line (AFOL), which enables our clients to select their furniture items via a laptop at the Arches.

The dedicated , hard  working Shop Floor, Administration, PAT testing and photography teams are all based  at the Ark providing vital and varying   roles to support  the ever growing demand for furniture.

This team has really expanded over the last year, but there is always room for more! What has been really encouraging is that we now have some previous visitors to the Arches joining our team as volunteers. The team sorts out all the donations of clothing, hanging the items up in the clothing arch and folding bed sheets and blankets etc. The task is never ending but it is vital to the smooth running of the Arches. The laundry team is a good starting point for volunteers as it operates just behind the scenes and gives people a chance to see where else they might like to serve.

Just 4 Women is held twice a month on Thursdays or Saturdays. The aim is to serve female clients of the Arches by providing a safe and relaxing environment in order to facilitate friendship among women and share the love of Christ through food, massage, manicure, facials, hairdressing and 'girl talk'.

This project was set up in the first arch as a natural response to the increasing number of people visiting the Arches, not for food, furniture or clothes, but for a cup of tea and a chat. Our vision is to provide a relaxed setting where everyday life may be momentarily forgotten - where guests are served and hosts have time to listen.

 
A lunch twice a month at the Arches after the morning service, on an invitation basis only. The aim is to provide a family-style sit down meal for people who are on their own and have perhaps recently started coming to church. Also to invite them into our lives a bit more and give them a sense of community and belonging that they may not have elsewhere.