Please note: This page was published with the purpose of being linked in an email update to Local Welcome mailing lists in June 2024.

Why are we making these changes?

• Freedom to serve the needs our groups - As you can imagine, operating Local Welcome with this constant uncertainty, and survivalist need to chase funding opportunities leads us to having to make tough decisions. Sadly, these often can’t be as centred around the needs and desires of those who matter most as we’d like them to be: our incredible local leaders, and all other members of our meal’s communities.
• Resilience for the future - Our groups are currently mainly funded through grant income. Since there is an unpredictable and ever-changing funding environment, this makes our groups vulnerable because they are dependent on funding decisions. Building up a strong support base from local people will make Local Welcome groups more resilient to the ebb and flow of funding decisions.
• We want to be there for as many communities as possible - community-centred local services are being cut at an alarming across the UK. In a world of stretched services and broken systems, we believe that Local Welcome meals are needed now, more than ever. In the last 6 months, we’ve been making changes to the way that we support our groups in running meals by sharing more running tasks with leaders, with the ambition of making our groups more autonomous. This is so our small team of 4 part-timers has more capacity to support leaders in launching new groups.

In short - when we’re funded by grant income, we’re accountable to funders. When we’re funded by membership income, we’re accountable to everyone who attends our meals (regardless of whether they donate or not)!