banner image promoting Bury St Edmunds Rotary Charity Auction

We are very grateful to Bury Abbey Rotary to be included as a beneficiary of their Online Charity Auction this March!

The Auction runs from Monday 4th March and finishes on Sunday 24th March at 10pm and raises much needed funds for local charities.

Click the link here to go to the Auction website for instructions on how donate a Lot or to place a bid.

image of Sponsor Form header for Rotary Club of Bury St Edmunds Swimarathon

We are also very grateful for the support of the Rotary Club of Bury St Edmunds in their Swimarathon on March 17th!

A team of Rotarians from the Rotary Club of Bury St Edmunds will be supporting The Rural Coffee Caravan in their forthcoming Swimarathon on March 17th.  Can you help us to find sponsors? All the funds raised by the team will kindly be donated to The Rural Coffee Caravan to support the work of the charity.

If you are also interested in entering another team to swim for The Rural Coffee Caravan at the event, we would be delighted to hear from you! There is no charge for entry, teams of 4 swim relay for 40 minutes and all the sponsorship money raised goes to the charity of each team’s choice.

Please get in touch if you would like a sponsor form or more information on getting involved.

Click here for more information about ways to donate to The Rural Coffee Caravan:

Local Giving logo

graphic of The Rural Coffee Caravan Logo - 2024

At the Rural Coffee Caravan we know that isolation doesn’t have to mean loneliness. To ward off loneliness people of all ages need connection.

A Rural Coffee Caravan Visit

What Happens On A Visit

map showing locations of Rural Coffee Caravan initiatives

What We Do – Near You

Volunteers serving refreshments for the Rural Coffee Caravan

Ways To Get Involved

Signposting

MeetUpMondays™

Coffee And Friends Events

More Than A Shop

Fundraising walk for the Rural Coffee Caravan

Supporting Our Charity

Welcome to our website

Rural Coffee Caravan creates social spaces in rural places.

Knowing what’s going on in our own communities isn’t always easy. It is especially difficult if access to transport is limited, or the village shop or pub or post office has gone or you live in one of Suffolk’s very scattered parishes.

The Rural Coffee Caravan (affectionately know as ‘the Coffee Caravan’) exists to help rurally isolated people in Suffolk access services and information to improve their lives, health and wellbeing, and to bring people together, empowering and strengthening rural communities. We work to alleviate loneliness and social isolation by providing occasions that engender conversations, leading to people feeling more a part of their community. Our service is free and accessible to everyone.

We think that loneliness is everyone’s business, now more than ever.

Follow the links above to find out more about Rural Coffee Caravan visits, about the various projects and initiatives we deliver across Suffolk, and take a look at our virtual leaflet rack and digital noticeboard. We share signposting information online!

If you have a question or enquiry, we’d love to hear from you – just click the button below!

Our News

International Women’s Day 2024

March 8th, 2024|

On 6th March our Chief Exec, Ann, took part in a panel discussion at Milsoms Kesgrave Hall for an International Women's Day event. Local Enterprise Manager at NatWest Business - Heidi Franklin chaired the discussion, on the theme [...]

  • Image of RCC CEO Ann Osborn as pictured in the East Anglian Daily Times with news of her receiving honorary degree from Suffolk University

University of Suffolk Honorary Doctorate Awarded to Ann

October 20th, 2023|

We’re absolutely delighted for our Ann - The Rural Coffee Caravan’s Chief Exec, who officially received her honorary doctorate degree from University of Suffolk in yesterday's culminating graduation ceremony. Accompanied by Rural Coffee Caravan [...]

The Coffee Caravan has been visiting Redlingfield for two years now and from a population of not much more than 100 we get a turn-out of 20-plus for their visits.

I would urge any village – large or small – to consider the benefits of their visits. If they stopped, many villagers would miss the regular meetings with the exceptionally friendly and well informed staff and volunteers.

Mike Ager, Clerk - Redlingfield Parish Meeting
Rural Coffee Caravan has given Ashbocking residents a friendly, confidential, impartial source of information for a variety of services and organisations, as well as a good reason to meet and share ideas together, with easy activities, coffee and cake!

Perfect!

Anna, Ashbocking
Thank you so much for your regular visits to our Village Lunch mornings in Stansfield village. Our village lunch attracts people from several of the surrounding villages, as well as residents of Stansfield.

We are most grateful for this useful resource, and its always a pleasure to have you join us, Garry.

Long may the Rural Coffee Caravan continue to enhance our life in this area of Suffolk.

Sally Carter, Organiser - Stansfield Village Lunch
Dave, Roger, Harold & myself attended Shotley, Brandon & Red Lodge with our Meccano, Hornby displays last year.

We had a very enjoyable time at each visit with lots of interest on our respective displays. The organisers went out of their way to ensure our attendance went without a hitch, food & drink was well presented and all attendees where very friendly and helpful.

Hope we can help you all again sometime this year.

Ron Frith
On behalf of the Rattlesden Good Neighbours Scheme I would like to thank the Coffee Caravan and its helpers for visiting Rattlesden.

We feel that the Rural Coffee Caravan is essential as it encourages rural villages, like ours,to do the things they have always done but that somehow were forgotten. It is so good that they are reminding us what “community” is about.

We look forward to further visits.

Jennifer Moore , Secretary - Rattesden Good Neighbours Scheme
I would like to thank you for your valuable advice about the possibilities available from MSDC for various aspects of funding for our Village Hall project.

As you know our new building is now finished and will be officially opened on July 7th.

Sue, Drinkstone Village Hall
Thank you for a lovely morning and the lift home. I really enjoyed meeting everyone. Please could you pass my thanks also to the gentleman who made me such a lovely cup of tea, I’m afraid I’ve forgotten his name though.

After I’ve finished this e-mail I’ll be searching Amazon for the cookbook you were telling me about.

Gillian
We attended the Coffee Caravan event in Brandon last year, we were very pleased to be invited to such an informative and interesting day!

It was packed full of stands with information and help for the local community. We certainly made some new contacts. We hope to do it again later this year.

The coffee was good too !!!!

Jenny Pease, Scheme Manager, Heathcote House, Brandon