Half Yearly Webinar, Celebrating Apprentices & our Values

Half Yearly Meetings – Webinar

On Monday, we held our first ever Half Yearly Update – a Live Webinar in Head Office, Warwick. As our trading area continues to expand across the UK, this was a great opportunity for us to increase participation and reach an even bigger audience, and for members who do not live near any of our physical meetings, to get involved.  We went into the meeting not knowing how many members would log in to view the webinar, so I am pleased to report that we had almost 100 members join in!  During the session, we had some great questions and feedback from our members, which really proved that this platform can be a success in the future.

ACS Heart of the Community – Celebrating Apprentices

James Eales, an apprentice in our Membership team was invited to attend the ACS (the Association of Convenience Stores)– Heart of the Community conference in London this week, followed by a parliamentary reception to celebrate the success of apprenticeships within food retail.  James joined other apprentices from Heron Foods and Southern Cooperative to meet Kelly Tollhurst, Minister for Small Businesses and Ruth George MP, Small Shops Chair.

 James at the ceremony with other apprentices (left) & (right) with Rachel Seagrave (Head of Learning & Development)

James started his apprenticeship in Customer Service with Walsall College last November and is already nearing completion. He is also an ambassador of the Young Co-operators Network so was an excellent representative for Midcounties at this prestigious event.  He said, “I was delighted with the opportunity to go to the Houses of Parliament with the Midcounties Co-operative, it shows that businesses like ourselves invest time with young people so they can reach their full potential.”

Show Racism the Red Card

Today I’m standing with USDAW, our Union and Wearing Red in support of ‘Show Racism the Red Card’, the UK’s leading anti-racism educational charity which aims to combat racism in football and other sports.

It was disheartening to read in the news that an international sporting event had attracted worldwide attention because of black players being subjected to racist abuse. Racism is unacceptable and it has no place in sport or society.

Wearing red will show your support and the funds raised will help the charity to deliver high-quality training and education to young people in schools and workplaces. Even if you are not already wearing red today, you can still donate £1 by texting the word RED to 70470. For more information please click here.

National Nursery Practitioner Day

Yesterday, our Childcare brand celebrated the hard work and dedicated commitment of their colleagues, on National Nursery Practitioner Day. Caring for so many children within the Little Pioneers means that our colleagues have to go the extra mile to provide the best childcare in our 44 nurseries nationwide. Each nursery set up ‘appreciation walls’ for parents and children to say thank you and share positive feedback on the great work they do.

World Values Day

Yesterday was World Values Day and as reported in Colleagues Connect our Chief Values Officer, Pete Westall, is in Kigali in Rwanda attending the International Co-operative Alliance’s global conference ‘Co-operatives for Development’. Pete has been moderating a session on “Co-operatives strategic positioning in value chains”, focussing on our work with Happerley to prove provenance and provide transparency in the food chain.  For more information see his Twitter feed @petewestall

Did you enjoy my blog? Why not leave me a comment below by signing in?