Mahdy Alraie

Understanding impact for community businesses – Challenges and good practices for community businesses and funders

Repository entry 1 July 2022

This paper explores what community businesses can do to understand their social impact, reflecting on the challenges and building on some of the good practices identified through three Power to Change-funded programmes (Bright Ideas, Trade Up and the Community Business Fund). This is presented following the three main elements that community bu…

Understanding the financial impact of Power to Change’s grant funding on community businesses

Repository entry 1 June 2022

This research paper emerged from the need to better understand the financial impact generated by Power to Change’s investment in community businesses. In other words, several years after Power to Change’s investment, what has the financial impact of each programme been on its grantees? The paper draws on previous work that identified the va…

How can funders support established community businesses? Lessons learnt from the Community Business Fund programme

Repository entry 1 April 2022

Power to Change funded the Community Business Fund (CBF) programme between 2016 and 2021 to support existing community businesses to progress towards greater self-sufficiency by increasing their trading income, securing an asset and / or significantly reducing revenue costs. This short evaluation report outlines the impact that the programme ha…

How can funders support early-stage community businesses? Lessons learnt from the Bright Ideas programme

Repository entry 1 March 2022

Power to Change funded the Bright Ideas programme between 2016 and 2021 to support community groups to develop, test and launch their community business ideas. This short evaluation report outlines the impact that the programme had on community groups and early-stage community businesses, and recommends ways in which funders can support them go…

Better understanding the financial impact of funding programmes through the ‘Year Zero’ approach

Repository entry 1 February 2022

Through funding programmes such as Trade Up and the Community Business Fund, Power to Change supports community businesses to trade for the benefit of their local community; yet how can we understand the financial impact that Power to Change has had on community businesses? The answer is not straightforward, and programme impact can be difficul…

Thematic Paper: Sector & Community Businesses

Repository entry 1 February 2022

This working paper explores how the concept of sector can be useful for funders to understand and support community businesses. It also presents recommendations for using sector typologies going forward.

While sector trends in the community business market are not always clear to identify, this research shows that sector typologies can nonethe…

Thematic Paper: Assets & Community Businesses

Repository entry 1 January 2022

Community assets – buildings or land which are used for the social interest or wellbeing of the wider community – can be essential to a community business’ service delivery and financial sustainability, and can contribute to greater community empowerment and pride. Power to Change supported communit…

Bright Ideas, Trade Up, and Community Business Fund: Year 2 Evaluation Report

Repository entry 1 May 2021

This report outlines evaluation findings from Renaisi’s evaluation of Power to Change’s Bright Ideas and Trade Up programmes, and its Community Business Fund. Each of these is different from the others and specifically targets different stages and support needs in the community business life cycle. However, they were all designed to supp…

Evaluation of Bright Ideas, Trade Up and the Community Business Fund: Impact on people and place learning paper

Repository entry 1 April 2021

This report builds on Renaisi’s interim evaluation report of Power to Change’s Bright Ideas and Trade Up programmes,  and its Community Business Fund, as well as contributing additional evidence to existing research around the impact of community businesses on people and place.

Amongst other things, it finds that:

Communi…