Asda Cardiff Bay opens free community room for local groups to use

We've opened a brand new community room at our Cardiff Bay store with a little help from the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress, plus local charities.

The community room is available free of charge for local charities and groups to meet, offering a reliable and warm space to host talks, meetings and other kinds of community activities.

The store's community champion, Onya Rowe, is inviting local groups to get in touch and book the room, which is available from 8am to 10pm.

Asda colleagues were joined by the Rt. Hon. The Lord Mayor of Cardiff, Cllr Graham Hinchey and the Lady Mayoress, Breast Cancer Now and representatives from Cardiff Foodbank, who were presented with a cheque for £300, and St Peter’s Primary School, who were presented with a cheque for £500.

Onya said: “It’s such a proud day to finally see the launch of our community room, as it will make such a difference for local groups, charities, and organisations. I’ve been hearing from many of these groups how they often struggle to find suitable venues - and in the current climate ones that are affordable. I’m really looking forward to welcoming many groups in the coming months."

Anyone who’s interesting in using the space should email Onya at [email protected]

The Lord Mayor of Cardiff, Cllr Graham Hinchey, who did the honours of cutting the Asda ribbon, said: “It’s wonderful to be here at Asda to open this dedicated space that can be utilised by many of our groups and charities in the community who need it to carry out their work. These charities and groups help bring people together as well as providing vital services, so it’s really great to see Asda Cardiff Bay and Onya helping them to do so.”

The store had a number of activities for the opening day including musical entertainment by Emilie Parry Williams who recently achieved four chair turns on this year’s The Voice, and the Town Crier.

It also relaunched the Green Token Giving programme to the store, bringing back the physical tokens which were on hold during the pandemic.

Customers got involved in the cyclone machine and competed to win tokens for one of the three selected local community groups, Penarth All stars Netball Club , Dinas Powys FC & Bute Town Community Centre all of whom will receive a cash donation from Asda’s charity, The Asda Foundation.