The closure of Brent Knoll’s village shop has prompted more than 150 households to respond to a survey questionnaire that explores the potential for the creation of a community shop.
The village’s shop shut down on March 1st, as we reported here, amid a community effort to get a new community-run shop opened in its place.
The survey has found 146 of respondents supported the idea of a community shop, with only one respondent opposed to the idea.
42 respondents agreed to be volunteers, to spend time as unpaid workers to staff a community shop, while 93 respondents also confirmed their willingness to invest between £50 and £100 to become shareholding investors.
Furthermore, 26 respondents declared their willingness to join the project’s steering group, while 12 people offered their professional skills to the concept.
“This is an amazing response to our online and paper questionnaires,” David Sturgess, a member of the initial steering group, told Burnham-On-Sea.com.
“Unfortunately, this venture coincides with the national Covid-19 crisis, so we are unable to hold the public meeting that we had planned as the next step.”
“Right now, it is important that we report the results of this public consultation process. Those results tell us that there is ample scope to talk to the Plunkett Foundation – the national charity that has helped more than 300 villages to convert their closed village shops into successful community shops.”
Meanwhile, the steering group for this Brent Knoll initiative is eager to respond to the current Coronavirus crisis.
“While we progress the results of our survey with the Plunkett Foundation, we’re trying to work with our Parish Council to ask the 42 people who put themselves forward as volunteers to support the council’s scheme to provide support for people affected by the Coronavirus rules in our village.”
“By providing volunteer support for people who have needs in this village, we can provide a ‘bridge’ between the loss of our village shop and the creation of a community shop”, added Mr Sturgess.
