A charity shop is celebrating its 20th anniversary of trading - two decades in which it has handed out more than £280,000 to community groups.

The cash given out by the Aspatria and District Charity Shop has been a lifeline for a number of organisations.

Generous townsfolk have been taking in second-hand items to the Queen Street store by the bagfull over that time, with volunteers working hard to sell the goods.

The money then goes into one central pot. Local groups are invited to make an application for a grant.

The committee which runs the shop then meets regularly to discuss the bids and decides which ones to hand the money out to.

Each group is allowed to bid for up to £750 at a time.

But there is no limit as to how many times any organisation can apply throughout the year.

Among the groups that have been supported are the town's churches, the chapel, schools and the Aspatria Dreamscheme youth club - as well as organisations in surrounding places such as the Westnewton village hall.

Marie Rose, the group's secretary, said: "It's a huge help to local people.

"We do get a lot of nice letters back saying thank you for the money and without it they couldn't carry on doing what they are doing.

"People really appreciate what we do.

"The first few years when we were getting established we didn't give that much out as we weren't getting that much in.

"But over the last few years we've really upped our game."

Their financial year runs from August to August and in the last 12 months they've taken in around £32,000.

"For a little place like Aspatria it's wonderful," Marie added.

"But we couldn't do it without people bringing goods in for us. Without that we wouldn't be able to sell things."

Glenda Monkhouse, the secretary to the Aspatria Methodist Church council, couldn't speak highly enough of the charity shop.

She said: "We've had a great deal of help lately and we really do appreciate them.

"We have put in new doors to our building and have replaced some windows. The toilets have been revamped too.

"Anything that we've been doing we have asked for support and they have come up trumps. The fund has been really good for us.

"If we didn't get the grants we wouldn't have envisaged those plans.

"We wouldn't have been able to raise that kind of money or it would've taken us a long time. They've always been very good to us."

The shop accepts everything except furniture because there isn't room inside the store to accommodate those larger items.

Electrical items are accepted.

The committee is always looking for more volunteers to help run the shop and the organisation behind it.

In total, around 28 people are involved with helping it to continue.