We would like to know more about community-owned village shops, the people involved and the essential services that they provide to communities. A hard copy of the second survey of community-owned village shops was sent to community shops with the latest edition of ViRSA’s Talking Shop Newsletter but further copies are available by emailing info@plunkett.co.uk. If you are involved with a community shop, we hope that you are able to complete this and return to us. This is also available electronically by clicking here.
The last survey of community shops was undertaken in 2005. This led to the following outcomes:
· The development of the Village CORE Programme that offers a financial start up package of £40,000 to new community shops in England – see http://www.virsa.org/index.cfm/villageshop/Programme.Home
· The first directory of community shops in the UK which is available at http://www.virsa.org/index.cfm/villageshop/Directory.Home
· Information on the size of the sector, the economic and social benefits provided to rural communities and the business support needs of community shops
We would be very grateful if you could assist us in this process by taking a moment to complete this questionnaire. We appreciate that it will take some of your time but we are sure you realise how valuable your input is in achieving an overall picture of community-owned village shops in the UK. Most of the questions only require you to tick a box. In some cases we ask you to write a little. All the information you provide will be treated in confidence and will only be viewed by the people carrying out this work or on an aggregated form which does not reveal the answers revealed from individual shops.
If you have any queries about the survey, please contact Mike Perry on 01993 810730 or by emailing mike.perry@plunkett.co.uk.
Back to News