Salisbury residents responded to the call during the King’s Big Help Out during the celebrations of the Coronation.

The Big Help Out was announced in January as an event to mark the Coronation in tribute to the King’s public service, encouraging people to volunteer and help their local communities.

On Monday, May 8, Salisbury Foodbank and Salisbury Pantry both set up booths in the Market Place and worked together to accept food donations from people across the community.

Salisbury Foodbank manager Maria Stevenson said the event was a success.

Maria said: “It’s been amazing. We’ve already taken one full van load off to our storage location. The volunteers have been fantastic. People have come over from local supermarkets with trolleys full.

"It’s been a really, really amazing community event, where not only my volunteers from the Salisbury Foodbank but volunteers from Salisbury Pantry are communicating and talking and learning more about the different food projects. It’s been a great community spirit all around.”

Salisbury City Council communities manager Sarah Gregson, who is responsible for the Salisbury Pantry, said she was also pleased with the turnout shown by the community.

Sarah said: “It’s gone really well. We had most of our activity during the first half of the day, but as a consequence we’re now able to drive two van-fulls of food off the Market Place and into our food projects. So that’s what we were here to do and that’s been very successful today.”

In addition to the food donations received, the pantry recruited seven new volunteers, and two people signed up to help run the community café held at Salisbury Baptist Church on Brown Street on Tuesday mornings.

Sarah said: “Actually, that gets us to a sustainable level right now, so it’s been really, really important for the pantry itself.”