Plunkett Rural Community Business Award sponsors

South East community creator Thakeham is sponsoring the Community Contribution category in this Year’s Rural Community Business Awards 2022.

The Plunkett Foundation

The first annual Rural Community Business Awards were held for the first time last year to celebrate the UK’s community-owned business sector. The awards are organized by The Plunkett Foundation – a national charity supporting community owned businesses across the UK.

The community contribution category in the awards, sponsored by Thakeham, will recognise UK individuals involved in community-owned businesses, who are going that extra mile for their community.

Thakeham is already working with The Plunkett Foundation to develop a partnership methodology to establish community businesses in the heart of their developments.

Thakeham has long recognised the importance of creating cohesive communities and as well as the importance of investing in services and assets. It sees community owned business as a vital mechanism to achieve their ambition of building inclusive sustainable communities.

The community business model will be used to create sustainable and vibrant hubs for communities to flourish. Local residents empowered to own and manage retail, café, meeting rooms, office facilities, allotments and accessible green spaces.

The Plunkett Foundation has over 100 years experience in supporting and establishing community businesses across the UK. The community business model has a current 95% long-term survival rate, proving it to be a resilient model to provide and retain vital local services that bring a community together.

Rural Community Business Awards

The awards feature seven categories – employment and training; environment; e-localisation of product; technology; volunteering; community contribution; and young person.

Nominations for the 2022 Rural Community Business Awards 2022 will close on Friday 30th September. Following that all nominations received will be shortlisted and presented to a panel of judges who will then select the winners from each of the Rural Vision award categories. Three finalists from the Community Contribution and Young Person awards who will then go to a public vote to find the overall winner.

Nominations are open to those within rural-based community businesses. This could apply to employees, volunteers, committee members or even a local resident who wants your local community business’s to be recognised. Thakeham and the Plunkett foundation would love to hear about your involvement and why you tihnk your community business deserves to be celebrated.

The 2022 Rural Community Business Awards award ceremony will take place on Thursday 17th November in London and will be hosted by TV presenter and auctioneer, Charlie Ross.

You can nominate your local community-owned business for this and other categories, at https://plunkett.co.uk/awards-6/