The Brief
- To boost the Cooperative Economy in Islington
- To provide training and support to new and emerging co-ops in the borough who were working in the Foundational Economy (that’s things like food, care, housing, health) so that they could make up a greater share of economic activity in the borough
- To work with Islington Council and its network of anchor institutions to embed community wealth building principles and get them supporting co-ops and buying goods and services from local co-ops
- To develop a strategy for long-term co-operative support in the borough
The Client
Islington Council has a strong Inclusive Economy policy, aimed at creating a borough where local businesses prosper, and local people have well-paid, secure jobs.To do this, they recognise the importance of maximising the number of ethical, local businesses in their own supply chain. Islington approached us in 2021 to see if we could help to build democratic businesses which had the potential to fulfil the supply chain needs of the council and other local institutions. This programme dovetailed well with the work that Outlandish was already doing through SPACE4.
Our Solution
We ran a one-year programme which gave out £75,000 in small grants to co-ops and co-ops-to-be, and provided them with a total of 30 days of specialist co-op business advice and support. In addition, we ran a programme of public events and training sessions, aimed at people working in co-ops and those interested in learning more about what it means to build a cooperative economy. We ran a total of 14 public events and training workshops with 170 attendees.
Simultaneously we did a lot of work to develop strategic partnerships in the borough to embed co-operatives into the local economy for years to come. We developed models for a long-term Cooperative Development Agency, and we ran a series of sector-specific roundtables which connected buyers and suppliers. These uncovered a range of opportunities within supply chains, as well as exposing some of the hurdles!
Impact
All the businesses who participated in the mentorship and support reported that the programme had helped them to gain confidence in running and growing a business. One co-op began providing services to Islington Council. Four businesses which hadn’t been registered as a co-op did register, or were well on their way to registration by the end of the programme.
In addition, one department within Islington changed the way that its procurement process worked, so that it was more accessible to small local providers, and Islington Council felt more informed of the opportunities and risks around delivering long-term cooperative development support.
“Since getting mentorship and funding we have been able to scale our business to another level. We have been able to form a Coop CIC that will help to mentor, build and promote small Black Owned businesses “
~ Tricia, Branding Buffet
“We received outstanding mentoring and I was able to generate some commercial income for the co-op.”
~ Rona, Empowered Talent
Going On
It felt like a year wasn’t nearly enough to get far with deeply examining supply chain needs of Islington’s Anchor Institutions. For many, progressive procurement is a fairly new concept, and the co-ops that we worked with were mostly not at a scale to start providing sufficient commercial services yet. We therefore plan to have a joined-up approach and a closer relationship with buyers in future iterations of Cooperate Islington (watch this space!).
