00:00My name's Stephanie, I'm the Community Hub Manager here at our Gloucester Road shop.
00:04We run a number of creative workshops here, so today we run a headband making workshop,
00:11as you can see today on my head, and that was an aid of our Great Daffodil Appeals.
00:16We also run events for our local communities, so we do regular stallholder events as well,
00:22where people can sell their artwork and their arts and crafts stuff here,
00:26and then we offer people the space for free, but they give us a 10% donation to the charity.
00:33And how did the idea come about of the Community Hub and the workshops you host?
00:39So the Community Hub was first launched by our Retail Director, Jackie Woolley, and she
00:46had the idea for the Community Hub as she wanted customers to see a different side of the charity,
00:51so she runs retail and wanted customers to see what Marie Curie does as a charity,
00:56what we're all raising money for, so that's why she's done the, so we have the support lines,
01:02people can come in and they have a direct line to our support service, all the different leaflets
01:07here as well that people can have access to, and it's a space where, so we've all had our
01:14brand ambassador training, so we can speak to customers all about what Marie Curie does as a
01:19charity. And then the ideas for the workshops came about probably about two years ago, so the
01:27previous Community Hub Manager, Dawn Parsons, had the idea for doing the workshops here as a way of
01:34engaging with the community and having another way to raise additional funds for the charity,
01:40so that's how the idea came about, and then within the past sort of year and a half that's
01:45really quite grown as well, so we do run workshops here probably about once to twice a month here,
01:51and it's been taken very well by the community who want to use the space to run their own
01:56workshops as well, as it's a way that local businesses and the community can get their
02:03stuff out there, and when people know that we've got the events happening here, people are very
02:09excited when they know that this is happening and they know that we have this space at the back too.
02:16So we've always had really good feedback from people, so recently we had a sip and paint which
02:21was one of our first evening, it was our first evening event that we did, and we got a very
02:26positive response from that one, and the community has really taken to it as well, so Co-op very kindly
02:32donated some Prosecco for us for that event, and we raised a lot of money for the charity of that
02:38event as well, so it's been, yeah, and we've got our regulars that come as well, our regular
02:44stallholders that love using the space too, so it's, yeah, been received very well and we're hoping
02:50we can raise more awareness of the space as well. We're always here for people if they need any
02:55additional support as well, that we are here, the space is open, and if anyone has any ideas that
03:02they might have for any events or any workshops, feel free to come to us to have a talk with us,
03:07and we'd be happy to help.
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