A TWO-man team is planning to help boost Christmas cheer in Minehead by personally collecting donated food from across the town to take to the Food Cupboard.

Hair salon owner Dan James and Chris Jones will be leafletting over 3,000 homes in the Minehead and Alcombe area, to give people advance notice of the collections.

This will be the second year running that they are taking on the challenge, after they went door-to-door to collect items for the first time last year.

They managed to fill around 150 boxes of non-perishable food to donate to the Food Cupboard.

“Last year a lot of people knew about it but lots did not, so we’re hoping this year even more people will recognise us and give even more,” said Dan.

Chris and Dan will be working on a tight timescale, delivering the leaflets a few days before they do their collections on the evenings of Wednesday December 4 and Saturday December 7.

“People will receive a leaflet through their door telling them which day we will be calling. Then if they want to and can, we’ll ask them to leave non-perishable foods on their doorstep.

“We will collect in our trolley, and this way we don’t have to bother or knock on anybody’s door.

“We think so many people would love to help others in need, especially this time of year, but just don’t have the time – so if we can help by making it easy for them to help others, then that’s great and our aim in all of this.”

The two men will go straight out after work and collect from about 6pm until 10pm, loading the food into Chris’s truck that they will park in each road as they go.

Dan said they did not have much leeway this year, as they will be trying to cover in two days what they did last year over three weekends.

They hope to have leafleted almost every house in the district, and will also be giving notice of the collections on social media.

“It’s good to give back, and we want to help people in the local area who are less fortunate.

“We don’t want Christmas Day to be just the same as any other – I just want to make other people happier if I can,” said Dan.

Dan and Chris are pictured on their collecting mission for Minehead Food Cupboard last year.