International Women's Day: Celebrating Slough and Windsor founders

We first spoke to Rebecca Mistry, co-founder of Baby Bank, in Windsor, who shared her experience on what it’s like to run a charity in the borough.

Founded in 2015, Rebecca set up the charity with Amy Tisi, councillor for Clewer and Dedworth East, who is now a trustee.

Rebecca teamed up with Lauren Hall to continue running the bank where they now have  around 20 volunteers a month helping them on a regular basis, predominantly female led.

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Rebecca said the idea for the bank started when her and Amy had initial conversations after meeting at their children’s playgroup.

She said: “We were both talking about how, if families are accessing food banks, there’s got to be a need for baby essentials too like nappies.

“It just snowballed from there really and we now support children up to the age of 16 with anything they need.”

Rebecca and Lauren run the Baby Bank together. Picture: Baby Bank

Rebecca added the aim of the bank is to reduce, reuse and recycle.

“It’s all about that, this way somebody else uses it instead of so much stuff going into landfill,” she said.

“We also try to encourage people who have used our service previously to come back and volunteer and we get extra help from Good Gym who come in a couple of times a week which is brilliant.”

Rebecca explained a new premises is also on the horizon, which she hopes to share more about soon.

Another woman who has celebrated the success of her recently opened brunch café in Slough is Juslena Randhawa.

The mother-of-three, who’s always had a passion for cooking, wanted to create a place for mums to relax around school pick up times.

Her café, Nashtaa, opened on London Road in June last year and has received non-stop rave reviews from customers ever since.

Juslena said when she was working for a corporate business, her heart just wasn’t in it.

“Having three kids I wanted to follow passion on my terms to work around balancing my mum life,” she said.

“I realised there was a huge gap in the market in Slough for places to go for brunch who use quality produce along with food that tasted great.”

Juslena wanted to create a brand that represented women, mothers and somewhere a community would come together to enjoy food.

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Living in Slough, Juslena said she wanted to give back and knew the Indian brunch café should be based there.

“I wanted to create something that as soon as the kids have been dropped off parents or anyone can come in for a yummy breakfast with a fusion twist and relax and enjoy themselves without rushing.”