The power of the Community (and the pub too!)

by Startacus Admin

Here at Startacus we appreciate that for many of us, the odd tipple warms not only the heart, but brings us and our friends together for a social. With pubs closing down, right left and centre and the local pub, shop, post office - in fact most of our local amenities facing a rather bleak future, we wanted to share a little gem with you, that is aiming to buck the trend. In fact, when you read this tale, perhaps it might inspire you and your local community to try the same thing...

Firstly, the gem of which we speak - The Bevy is not the first ever Co-operative Pub. It is however aiming to be the first ‘urban’ community co-op estate pub in the UK.

Becoming a ‘co-op’ can be a great way of gaining community support and influence and having set up in the last six months or so, The Bevy, formally The Bevendean Pub in Brighton is aiming to do just that and opened by raising £200,000 in capital to develop the hub/pub.

In an era of Facebook and Twitter, where chat and community is often limited to the online world, we love the thinking behind The Bevy. As they so eloquently state on their blog:

“The focus will be on developing a hub for the community, a pub that people will want to live close to, a cafe that will draw people out of their homes, a place to eat that will stop people going into town, a facility to provide training and experience to our young people.

We want to establish something quite distinct from the old pub that operated out of the premises. We will use our community-ownership structure to build greater goodwill and buy-in from the community, aiming to serve a wide range of needs that will diversify our revenues from those of a traditional pub.

We will seek to provide community benefit not just through successful operation, but will seek to add value for all involved, from paying a living wage or better to all our staff, through to making the facilities available to meetings and training.”

Powerful stuff. Taking you back to a time of community centres, village fetes, sports days and a sense of true belonging; projects like The Bevy, should be celebrated for their attempts to not only create a sense of community, but also create something that is unique and special.

In an environment of high street chains and out of town shopping, sterile tasting beer, flat pack furniture and online chat (don’t get me wrong we have used all of the above!) it is great to see ‘co-ops’ like this making a go of it and creating a ‘hub’. We’re looking forward to following this story as it continues to develop. Perhaps take a few moments out yourself to see how you can get involved, or if there are other ‘co-op’ projects happening in your local area.

A big “I am Startacus!” to The Bevy self starters.

 

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Published on: 24th October 2012