Fifteen months since the Moree Drought Muster kicked off, the team has renewed their efforts to help struggling families as Christmas fast approaches and the drought's grip tightens across the community.
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The Moree Drought Muster was started by McGregor Gourlay's Bree Pring, Maddison Richards and Tegan George in July last year to help make life a little easier for farmers doing it tough in Moree and surrounding areas.
Back then, Ms Pring never imagined the drought would still be continuing now, with no end in sight.
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Back then, the drought was mostly just impacting farmers. Now, with local businesses being forced to cut hours and staff, the impact is being felt across the whole community.
"Before, it wasn't really affecting the town and we thought it'd break before that happened," Ms Pring said.
"But the reality now is just how bad it's affecting the community; businesses are cutting hours, there's been staff cuts across town.
With that in mind, Ms Pring and Ms Richards decided to put a fresh call out to the community to help those struggling in the lead-up to Christmas.
This time, however, they understand that businesses are also struggling and don't have much to give, which is why they're instead asking people to support our local family-owned businesses by buying small gift vouchers to donate instead.
"If you have a spare $10, drop into a local family-owned business whether it be the butchers, hairdressers, servo, hardware shop or even the mechanic and grab a voucher," Ms Pring said.
"Ten dollars from your local hairdresser doesn't seem like much, but it's the difference between someone getting a wash and blow-dry.
"So we thought if we can get a bit of momentum going, we can help local businesses, as well as local families."
The team will also be taking donations of toys for children and beer/wine for adults to make the festive season a little more jolly for those who would otherwise be going without.
"There are a lot of kids this Christmas that are going to go without, their families are already going without, and that's upsetting," Ms Pring said.
The Moree Drought Muster will do a call-out for people needing help, and for now will be focussing on families with children and those who haven't already received support.
If you would like to receive support, contact Bree Pring on 0429 878 104.
All donated items can be dropped to Dipper's Home Timber and Hardware.
