Community Campaign to save De Bees in Winsford

Damon Horrill FRSA with The Hive Live Ltd, are helping support a community funded campaign to save de bees, the last remaining entertainment venue in Winsford.

De Bees, attracts thousands of visitors to Winsford as well as providing a popular destination venue for the local community to get together and be entertained, the venue is one of many grassroots music venues threatened with extinction, artists such as Tom Walker, Catfish & The Bottlemen, John Bishop, Alan Carr and Jason Manford all kick started their careers at de bees. However, after long term under investment the venue was forced to reduce its programme of cultural activity in recent years, and has now been put up for sale to property developers, with a view to close at the end of the month.

The Hive Ltd, a charitable community benefit society, has started a community share offer with ethical investment platform Ethex, to save the venue and purchase the building for renovation. Their pitch is live until July 26^th, with a first deadline of June 28^th. They need to raise £180K for drawdown to complete with EI Group (the owners) by their new deadline of 1st July.

The Hive is aiming to purchase the building and renovate as a 7 day a week cultural venue with a wide ranging programme for all ages and tastes from gigs to movies, gaming to bingo to help meet the society’s charitable objects. The Hive also has an exciting partnership with Warrington & Vale Royal College to base a work experience project above the building where students, with help from Hive mentors, run all aspects of projects, events at the venue and annual community festivals that The Hive has run since 2011. The College are one of the Government pilots for the new 45 day a year work placement requirements, up from 35 hours! So it is an important initiative to trial for other communities in advance of the government roll out across all colleges by 2024.

Contact Damon Horrill FRSA to find out more on MyRSA here.