{"id":21151,"date":"2025-09-16T19:23:04","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T23:23:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/2025\/09\/16\/stockton-cafe-owner-helping-others-in-memory-of-friend\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T19:23:04","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T23:23:04","slug":"stockton-cafe-owner-helping-others-in-memory-of-friend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/2025\/09\/16\/stockton-cafe-owner-helping-others-in-memory-of-friend\/","title":{"rendered":"Stockton cafe owner helping others in memory of friend"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

<\/p>\n

Emilia Martinez-Barnfather<\/span>BBC News, North East and Cumbria<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n

BBC<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Sam Elliott says she wants to help people in memory of her best friend who died in 2015<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

A woman who gave up drugs after the death of her best friend has opened a community cafe to help others who are struggling.<\/p>\n

Sam Elliott, 50, created The Caff in Stockton-on-Tees as a “safe space” for people struggling with issues like loneliness, the cost-of-living crisis and addiction. <\/p>\n

Ms Elliott said she stopped taking drugs after the death of her best friend who suffered a heart attack caused by crack cocaine use in 2015.<\/p>\n

“That day, I swore I’d never touch it again – and I didn’t,” she said. “I’m 10 years clean now and in her memory I’ve just helped everybody I can.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Ms Elliott said the cafe “welcomes everyone” who might need an affordable meal or a “friendly chat”. <\/p>\n

“We see a lot of drug addicts down here, and we don’t judge anyone. They’re the people that need us the most, because not everybody’s out there for them.<\/p>\n

“They’re the sort that will hand out flyers for us and [we] give them a hot meal or a cup of coffee.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

Ms Elliott runs the cafe with the help of manager Gemma Davis<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

In April, with the help of mum Lynne Russell, Ms Elliott opened Helping Hands in the unit next door to The Caff, selling donated goods. <\/p>\n

When the neighbouring unit became vacant and was offered to her by its landlord, she decided create the community cafe. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

Sam’s mum Lynne Russell said keeping both businesses open “is a struggle”<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
\n

Ms Russell, who now runs the day-to-day operation at Helping Hands, said she was “really proud” of her daughter for “what she’s achieved”. <\/p>\n

Ms Elliott said: “We just aim to help people and provide a little safe space and warm space for people that just need somewhere to vent. <\/p>\n

“A lot of people need it.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Emilia Martinez-BarnfatherBBC News, North East and Cumbria BBC Sam Elliott says she wants to help people in memory of her best friend who died in 2015 A woman who gave up drugs after the death of her best friend has opened a community cafe to help others who are struggling. Sam Elliott, 50, created The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21152,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,21,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-market","category-news","entry","has-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sharewatch.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}