Good Bitches Baking Whanganui expands with prison visits, seeks volunteers

Tania Taylor is excited to start Whanganui's first prison baking programme. Photo / Olivia Reid

The Whanganui chapter of Good Bitches Baking (GBB), a nationwide volunteer service, is expanding its horizons with prison visits.

It is also on the hunt for new volunteers.

In 2014 Nicola Murray and Marie Fitzpatrick came up with the idea of GBB over a glass of wine in Wellington.

It has now expanded into a charity organisation with branches from Whangārei to Invercargill.

In 2016 the Whanganui branch opened with the mission to provide baking for charities and services helping communities and people in need.

“There’s a real need out there in the community for lots of organisations who are struggling and if we can just add some sweetness, kindness and some sugary things to their day because some people just don’t get it,” the head of Whanganui GBB Tania Taylor said.

Taylor has been baking for GBB for more than a year.

She decided to volunteer as she loved baking and felt it was a well-suited way to give back to the community.

“We do a survey every year and from last year’s survey [the volunteers] said they want to give back to the community, they want to do that through the kindness of baking,” Taylor said.

GBB donates sweet treats to charity organisations across the country. Photo / Belinda Barber

GGB Whanganui has 66 active volunteers, many of them retired women, sharing the workload of providing for the organisations but Taylor hoped to recruit more volunteers to help more people.

“We’re always looking for more volunteers because I know that there’s more recipients out there in the community that would love and benefit from our baking.

“The recipients really appreciate it and that’s rewarding in itself.”

GBB Whanganui provides for 16 recipient organisations including Cancer Society, Koha Shed, Women’s Refuge and Mental Illness Survivors Team (Mist).

“Mist has a large number of vulnerable people in our community so having home baking, that is of an amazing standard, is really a luxury for our members,” Mist manager Renee Kaponga said.

“Honestly, it’s such a positive thing for us.”

GBB Whanganui will participate in its first-ever prison bake in early March, a programme started by GBB in 2018.

The prison bake is a six-week programme where GBB volunteers teach people in the self-care unit of prisons to bake. The baking is shared within the prison and donated to a recipient organisation.

“It’s about teaching the prisoners some kindness, and how kindness can be shown through baking,” Taylor said.

GBB has caused some controversy with people taking offence, meaning the organisation is not able to place flyers seeking volunteers in many public spaces.

The GBB website explains the methodology behind the name choice.

“If you want to take the sting out of a word, you claim it back. You turn the insult on its head and you get the next generation to associate positive things with these words, so they can’t be used in anger.

“If using a ‘swear word’ in our name helps to get people to think about our message, then that’s a win.”

Last year 783 boxes were delivered, totalling an estimated $74,777 of time, fuel, groceries and equipment.

Nationally, 3429 volunteers in 30 branches donated 34,166 boxes to 533 recipient organisations.

Anyone interested in volunteering for GBB can contact whanganui@gbb.org.nz or visit the website gbb.org.nz

Olivia Reid is a multimedia journalist based in Whanganui.