Woman set up company to tackle bed poverty

A woman who made it her mission to provide carpets to families in need has expanded her goal - and is now providing them with beds.

After realising she had unwanted carpets following her home extension in 2021, Pia Honey created a community interest company No Floor No More, providing second-hand carpets to social housing tenants who might otherwise have to make do with bare floors.

The entrepreneur, from St Albans, said council and housing association properties were routinely left with partial floor coverings and estimated she had provided flooring to about 1,400 properties.

Ms Honey has now extended her business and is providing beds and other household items to people who might otherwise have to sleep on the floor.

A recent survey suggested three quarters of new social housing tenancies came with no, or only partial, flooring coverings.

The charity Barnardo's estimated more than one million parents in the UK give up their beds each night for their children.

She now splits her week between her part-time beauty therapy job, caring for her grandchildren, and her charitable work.

She said she was providing beds for up to 20 families every month.

Kelly, a single mother of two children, had been sleeping on her sofa in her Hertfordshire home for more than two years to enable her children, a girl aged 10, and a boy, who is four years old and autistic, to have their own rooms.

"My main focus was the children having their own bedrooms," she said.

"If I'm up all night, I will feel the impact of it, next day... as a parent, you do put yourself last."

Lynn Perry, chief executive of Barnardo's, said the impact on parents was "feeling under pressure, not being able to provide the essentials" and could leave them "unable to see where the next break is coming from".

"For lots of children [having a bed] has a real impact on their sense of well-being," she said.

"If you're sleeping in a mattress or a floor in a room that's shared with others you're not going to get a decent sleep.

"Also, it's the stigma of poverty and some of that is hidden for some families and I think that's really difficult for children to carry as well."

Ms Honey said: "It's heartbreaking... if you haven't got a warm cozy bed or you've got a mattress on the floor; no-one should be like that - not in this country.

"They've got to heat their houses, and way down on their priorities is a bed for their child."

Ms Honey relies on donations, fundraising and her own money to cover much of the project, as the company has not secured any grants yet.

The warehouse full of carpets, mattresses and other household items are distributed at vastly-reduced prices or sometimes given away for free.

"As we're not funded, we need to ask money from some people, but if the situation is dire, we just sometimes ask for a donation which we may or may not get," she explained.

Kelly has now been helped by Ms Honey and recently took delivery of a sofa bed.

"Having my own bed is going to make a huge difference to my life," she said.

"Once the kids are in bed I can feel human again. It's super important that I have that comfort - and my own space.

"I'm just blown-away at the generosity of a stranger."

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