290+ volunteers not employees.   A community group of volunteers, improving the environment in Crewe.
Crewe Clean Team held its first monthly group litter pick in January 2012 and its 140th in Spring 2026.
Members borrow equipment at their first event and keep it after their second event, so that they can clean up regularly in their own area.
Aluminium cans are separated and recycled – 280,000 by May 2026.

In 2024, we started the 'Save Our Swifts (SOS) Crewe' Project to attempt to reverse the decline in the number of these birds in our town.  In 2012 (the year Crewe Clean Team began), there were 450 pairs of birds in a 'Supercolony' North of West St.  In 2022, just 50 birds were counted in the same area.  So far, we have installed 67 boxes and we now make the boxes locally.  We are talking with housing developers to accelerate the process. 

Every October since 2013, the Team has supervised local cubs in the planting of thousands of bulbs at Christ Church in the centre of Crewe.  In recent years, they have planted at Valley Park, too.

We developed the 'Wildlife Planning Initiative' that is followed by Crewe Town Council.  This is a document (and a series of handy aide-memoire cards) that lists many ways in which new housing developments should be wildlife-friendly.  Town Councillors are encouraged to refer to the cards at every planning meeting to ensure that opportunities to create habitats for animals are not missed.

After much urging, we persuaded Cheshire East Council to add mass balloon releases to the list of events that cannot be held on Council land.  The injury to wildlife and littering that balloon releases cause are simply unacceptable in our society.

We raise £100s every Red Nose Day and our members donated over £250 to the Ukraine Disaster Fund in 2022.