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Yapton Pharmacy, on Main Road, has raised nearly £300 for the British Red Cross in Ukraine after a successful bake sale.

The sale took place on Thursday, March 10 and pharmacy manager Katharine Johns spent her day off baking 130 cakes to help the British Red Cross bring relief to refugees and civilians across the Ukrainian frontline.

"It was well worth it," she said. "I just couldn't bear seeing all those pictures on the news on the time without doing anything to help. We had a little chat as a team and decided we wanted to do something.

"So it all just went from there. We thought 'we all like cake. Everyone likes cake.' And we decided it would be a good way to raise some money, even if people only gave a bit of spare change. So, rather than put a set price on the cakes, we just let people donate whatever they want."

Thankfully, the pharmacy's customers gave more than 'a bit of spare change' and staff raised £290.75, all told—a figure with which Mrs Johns was more than happy: "I wanted to raise about £200 anyway, so I'd have been happy with that. But having opened the jars on Wednesday to see we'd already beat that with quite a few cakes left to go, I was pretty impressed with that. In general the response has been overwhelming."

Part of that success is most certainly down to the quality of Mrs Johns' baking—one customer came back for seconds— but it also stands testament to the extent of local sympathy for the humanitarian crisis unravelling in Ukraine.

"The people in Ukraine are just normal, ordinary people who, a few weeks ago, were going about their everyday lives just like the rest of us. And then all of a sudden, their entire lives have been completely ripped out from under them. It's just horrible to see it. Through no fault of their own, these people have lost everything," Mrs Johns said.

Yapton Pharmacy raises nearly £300 for Ukraine with successful bake sale

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