Delves Charitable Trust

The Delves Charitable Trust, established in 1922 with formal deeds in 1946 and 1955, is a long-standing, family-led grant-making charity governed exclusively by Breeze family trustees. Its core mission is to advance public benefit through discretionary support for a broad spectrum of charitable activities, with no fixed themes, beneficiaries, or geographic limits. Emphasizing careful stewardship, the Trust prioritizes maintaining its endowment's real-terms value via prudent investments and annual impact reviews, often advised externally, to maximize outcomes from focused grant programmes. This generalist ethos enables flexible funding across sectors, favoring smaller organizations where grants can drive significant relative impact.

It supports diverse charitable projects, including core costs and defined-term programmes, as selected by trustees—recently disbursing £251,325 across 23 UK charities without sector exclusivity. Eligible entities are strictly UK-registered charities or Community Interest Companies (CICs), with a preference for smaller-scale operations showing high impact potential; no formal income thresholds apply, though larger organizations are less typical.

Grants typically range from £5,000 to £25,000, awarded at trustees' sole discretion following their annual June meeting—no unsolicited applications are accepted, and there are no public deadlines or processes. Recipients are proactively identified, with ongoing programmes subject to yearly effectiveness reviews.

Distinctively invite-only and impact-oriented, the Trust avoids direct support for individuals or communities, publishes no grant lists, and differentiates through its sustainable, family-centric model, unrestricted charitable scope (despite practical focus on England, especially the South East and Home Counties), and commitment to enduring social benefit over scale. Charities should demonstrate clear, measurable outcomes to align with trustees' strategic priorities.