Prepared for Home-Start Croydon by Adrian Taylor, 2026-10-05. If you work there and would rather this page came down, say so and it comes down.

Home-Start Croydon: what the records show, and what we could do together

1. What you say, and where we read it

We read your website (Home-Start Croydon | Because childhood can't wait) and your public channels.

• “We help families with children under five with practical and confidential support.” (croydon-homestart.co.uk)
• “We offer a unique service to families by recruiting and training volunteers, who are usually parents themselves, to provide informal, confidential and friendly support for parents in both their home or a group setting.” (croydon-homestart.co.uk)

Your channels: x (closed to readers, not read); facebook (closed to readers, not read).

2. Croydon’s charities, from outside

407 charities are based in Croydon, 10.4 for every 10,000 residents, where 28% of residents are on low incomes. 17% show under three months’ reserves or three years of deficits on their latest return; 5% take half or more of their income from government. The five largest hold 62% of the area’s charity income.

Families with young children in Croydon

In Croydon, the national network for your field (families with young children) sits above the middle of England's areas for the number of people counted there (gold in the chart below where a field has none recorded here or is in the thinnest fifth). Across England, 5,736 charities outside the field say in their own reports that they serve the same people, against 2,329 in it.

The 23 fields, against England

For each field of charity work we have mapped, where Croydon stands among England’s 152 areas for the presence of the national network per person in need. Gold bars are the fields where no presence is recorded here (4 of 23) and those in the thinnest fifth of areas (2).

Croydon: the bar is where the area stands among England's 152 areasnone recorded here, or in the thinnest fifthEngland's median area

Point at a bar for its figures. Thin first A to Z

Who does the work here, by register purpose

A charity records up to three purposes, so the circles overlap. Point at one for its count.

3. Sample campaign

Three posts in your voice from the figures above, each with its picture, ready to use. Every figure is from public information and no charity is named.

4. What working together looks like

	What you get	What it costs
The area report	Your area's charities from outside, with your own field first: how thin the known network is here for the people you work with, who else does the work, how exposed the area's charities are, what the money looks like. A page like this one, in full, refreshed each quarter.	£600 once, or £1,200 a year with four refreshes
A campaign from the findings	Three to five posts a month in your voice, each with its picture, from your area's own figures.	£250 a month

The first month: a twenty-minute call, your page in full within a week, and the first campaign posts the week after. Prices are set by income band from the public register and are the same for everyone in the band.

5. How to say yes

Reply to the email with a day that suits, call or text Adrian on the number in the email (it is on the Contact page too), or write to adrian@charityinabox.uk.

What this can and cannot say. These are counts over groups of charities and places from their own returns and reports and from national statistics. They do not rank any charity, name any, or say why. A thin field is one where the known network is thin for the people counted here, not one where nobody is helped.

Built from public information: the Charity Commission for England and Wales register and the annual reports charities file with it (OGL v3.0); Census 2021 (ONS); the English Indices of Deprivation 2025 (MHCLG); the Claimant Count (ONS). Privacy.