Lubavitch is continuing to expand in Essex, defying the trend towards contraction in the area which has led to recent synagogue mergers.
The movement is planning activities for the growing number of families in Epping. It has also begun collaborating with the Southend community and recently brought a rabbinic couple into Barkingside.
"We believe that this is not a dying community, but a changing one," said Rabbi Aryeh Sufrin, executive director for Chabad in north-east London and Essex.
Supporters raised £50,000 to help fund its five-year development plan at a dinner on Sunday, which was addressed by former Israel Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau.
It was Rabbi Sufrin's late parents, Rabbi Aron Dov and Henny Sufrin, who brought Lubavitch to Redbridge in 1976.
‘Others are contracting, we are bringing more people in’
He and his wife, Devorah, who have been based there since 1983, have been undeterred by the fall of nearly a third in the Redbridge Jewish population - from 14,800 in 2001 to 10,200 at the time of the last Census in 2011.
"Whereas others are contracting, we are bringing more people in," Rabbi Sufrin said. "We don't jump ship." Noticing that more Redbridge Jews were moving further out to leafier Epping, they have started to organise events there.
"We did a Friday night in a local hotel before Pesach and 65 people came, including a number of young families with children. The majority had moved in the last three to five years but one couple had been there for 30 and didn't know any other Jews in the whole of Epping."
Another Shabbaton is planned there in the coming weeks, as well as a Yom Kippur service.
The Epping initiative follows similar outreach work in Buckhurst Hill, where a Chabad centre opened 10 years ago. Buckhurst Hill is now under the wing of Rabbi Odom Brandman, who is originally from Chigwell, and his wife, Henny. "We'd like to build an extension because for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, people have to sit on the stairs," Rabbi Sufrin said.
Earlier this year, Rabbi Rafi and Chaya Brocha Goodwin were recruited to work in Barkingside, about a 30-minute walk from Chabad's Gants Hill centre. Rabbi Sufrin explained that "having a local couple makes it easier to invite people for Shabbos - people we've had no contact with before or may have lost contact with".
Lubavitch now has four rabbinic couples covering Essex. It also runs cheder classes for children in Gants Hill, Buckhurst Hill and, more recently, Southend, where Mrs Sufrin also leads a monthly women's study circle.
"If you provide the services people need, they will come and participate," Rabbi Sufrin said. "Many people we pick up don't belong to a synagogue. We're looking to give them that little bit of Judaism they have shied away from."