Alz Café visit, Share of the Profits goes live & Ask me a Question
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Published 25 Nov 2022 in Phil's blog
On Tuesday I had the pleasure of revisiting Alz Café in Wolverhampton. Alz café which operates out of the Penn United Reformed Church is a meeting place for people with dementia or memory loss, their families and friends. The aim of the service is to provide a safe, welcoming environment for people with dementia and their family, friends and carers in the company of other carers, volunteers and health and social care professionals.
I first visited the café in January 2020 on its very first coffee morning. Whilst the Covid pandemic stopped it in its tracks, it was amazing to see how much it has grown since that very first meeting and the church was packed with people. I met a couple who will celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary next year. They told me that as they are in their 90’s, they had been sadly only losing friends until visiting the café where they are now making many new ones!
On the day, Food District manager, Gregg Seymour, was on hand to hand out the mince pies along with colleague Kelly Schofield from our Finchfield travel branch. They did a sterling job serving tea and coffee.
The work that Julie Grainger and her team of volunteers do is truly humbling and has a massive impact on the lives of the people supported by the café. It is our pleasure to support them in the work they do.
Share of the profits are live
This week sees the launch of our annual Share of the Profits, distributing some £1.1million to Midcounties members. A bonus for our members, it also helps drive trade to all our businesses, particularly Food Retail during their critical Christmas trading period.
Members can access vouchers in a range of ways, on the app digitally, paper vouchers plus an opportunity of donating them to charity via their share accounts. For further information please click here.
European Co-operative’s Youth Conference - Young people within the co-operative movement
Earlier this week, Chief Values Officer, Pete Westall along with young member colleagues Amelia Crews and Shannon Williams attended the European Co-operative’s Youth Conference in Cardiff hosted by Coops Europe. An event which saw a multitude of co-op's from across Europe come together it discussed the importance of our young people within the co-operative movement.
Giving a keynote talk to attendees, Pete and Amelia discussed how Midcounties attract and integrate young voices in the Society, utilising examples of digitalisation of our member app and Youth EmPowered (a youth-led community energy group with 70% of their directors 30 and under). A few themes that were raised during the event included the need for representation of young people at board of director level, the role community energy plays in fighting both the energy and climate crisis in a co-operative way, and the power of intergenerational, cross-border exchange.
I would like to say thank you and well done to young members, Amelia and Shannon for representing Midcounties on a global level by helping to drive ongoing young member representation and for the great work you are doing. I look forward to talking more about this in the near future.
Ask me a question – Colleague Q&A
It’s always great to chat to colleagues when I meet them, but my colleague Q&A’s give me a first-hand perspective on what colleagues think and how we can support them where possible. With the next colleague Q&A coming up, it’s your chance to submit a question via your Colleague Council representative. As mentioned last week, your queries really do make a difference and ensure that we continually improve and provide support where necessary. So, I encourage you to send through your questions to your colleague council representative, which can be on anything.
If you missed the last one, click here.
Finally, I am sure many of you will be watching the English and Welsh football teams as they look to progress at the Football World Cup in Qatar. Let’s hope they both get through the group and meet each other again in the final. Stranger things have happened!
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