Hope you are sitting comfortably - lots to update on!

 

November has been a big month for the BVCP project - and momentum is accelerating into December!

 

Firstly, we are delighted to announce new joiners to our Steering Group who are broadening the base of experience and knowledge that’s developing plans for our community pub. India Tuer, Ken Jones, Pete Noble and Wendy Frith are now part of the team and we are already benefiting from their good counsel, connections and understanding of the needs of the Valley. Don’t hesitate to ask them about progress and input your ideas further too.

 

A big aim for November was to extend awareness of the newest (and best!) community pub project in Cumbria. We are now live and active on the web, Facebook and Twitter - and most recently Instagram too.  Thanks to your help in sharing the word, we have nearly doubled our base of email subscribers, rapidly got close to 150 Facebook followers and are making progress on Twitter. Instagram has just launched and is ramping quickly. Our goal is to get to 350 connections per channel by the time we launch the Share Prospectus late January 2022 - so all further help with ‘Follows’, ‘Likes’, ‘Shares’ and ‘Retweets’ is much appreciated! (We also want to know who wants to hear about us on proper paper only - let us know names & addresses please and we will mail stuff out).

 

To make the project real, we are very focused now on fundraising both via the share offer and other grant providers. A draft Share Prospectus is nearly complete and will soon be shared with expert practitioners to assure its content is appropriate for a ‘Community Shares Standard Mark’, ie it is a clear, honest and transparent document that investors can make an informed decision against. In parallel we are working avenues into various grant providers - and have draft content prepared for when the Government reopens the ‘Community Ownership Fund’ scheduled for this month. Related to that, we are delighted and grateful that our local MP, Dr Neil Hudson, has connected with us and shared his support.

 

Finally, to help publicise things further, we really need your help from the Valley for a quick (socially distanced, outside) community photo in front of The Mardale. Scheduled time is this Sunday December 12th at 0930 for a maximum of 15 minutes. The low winter sun on the front of The Mardale unfortunately drives this time (hopefully we will get some!). Feel free to bring along a winter tipple if you need the early motivation!

 

And very finally, some links to online items in case you have missed them during the month:

 

• Our exclusive Terry Abraham Gallery - more images coming during December!

• Our letter of support from Dr Neil Hudson MP or the ‘Ultimate Mardale Pub Quiz’ - thanks to BDLHS for this!

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The BVCP Team (Catherine, India, Kate, Ken, Patrick, Peter, Phil, Rich, Sue, Wendy)