This paper outlines what the next government must do to give community businesses the right powers, resources, and backing.
All London
This Community Improvements Districts guidance helps communities imagine new possibilities for high streets, and gives readers the tools they need to make those possibilities a reality.
Scoping and analysing community business’ role in the transition to a fairer, greener economy
Empowering Places was a unique five-year programme designed by Power to Change to explore ways in which ‘locally rooted’ anchor organisations, operating in areas of high deprivation, could be supported to catalyse community businesses...
Our 2022 annual report reviews the eighth year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and our future plans, alongside a financial review of 2022 and our statutory accounts.
A new report explores how community businesses compare to other third sector organisations across England and Wales.
Community Improvement Districts (CIDs) provide a new approach for community stakeholders to have more say on strategic direction of the high streets alongside local authorities, businesses and other local stakeholders. Power to Change has piloted this model in six places across England, with a learning process led by The Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research, and Shared Assets.
This report was written by Clear Impact Consulting and retrospectively evaluates Community Business Crowdmatch, which ran between 2017 and 2022 in partnership with Crowdfunder UK.
Insights and learnings from the Financial Capabilities pilots, delivered by The Women's Organisation and Locality.
Since 2015, Power to Change has made significant investments in research, evaluation, and data analysis to better understand whether community businesses improve places, and, if so, whether we have supported them to do so.
This new Take Back The High Street report by Power to change explores the reasons why high street vacancy rates have increased and set out the policy change needed for community-led regeneration of our high streets.
This report, produced by Spark Insights and Locality, and commissioned by Power to Change, explores the experiences of community businesses and organisations led by or supporting people experiencing marginalisation on the barriers and solutions to accessing funding and support.
The pilot programme for Community Improvement Districts (CIDs) has emerged from a continuing need to revitalise traditional high streets and town centres. We explore our learnings so far.
A new report on 'levelling up' from Power to Change reveals that some progress has been made for communities, but there is little impact being made, leading to public pessimism.
A new report by the British Academy and Power to Change explores how social infrastructure contributes to communities’ wellbeing, helps develop their resilience and tackles deepening geographic inequalities.
Power to Change responds to the Labour Party’s Report of the Commission on the UK’s Future.
With a general election on the horizon, Power to Change has set out its key policy asks of the next government to create the conditions for community businesses to thrive.
This report takes a strategic look at the role community businesses can play in addressing the challenges of UK high streets. It considers how community businesses can succeed in high streets, what they can contribute, and what support they need to make a long-term difference to restore ‘pride in place’ in struggling town centres.
Our 2021 annual report reviews the seventh year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and our future plans, alongside a financial review of 2021 and our statutory accounts.
Community businesses can transform the progressive social intentions of younger generations into meaningful and sustainable community action. This report showcases the many ways young people came to be and are involved in community businesses.
This paper puts forward the concept of a High Street Buyout Fund – an agile fund which will purchase high street buildings and transfer these into community management and ownership.
New report exploring the 'Year Zero' approach to understanding the impact of Power to Change's investment
Scoping the opportunities, considerations and areas of focus for the design of a community business climate action programme.
Community Business Market in 2021 report shows thriving sector provides economic and social boost despite the pandemic.
Five ‘practical learning guides’ have been developed to share learning emerging from community energy innovation projects. These should be useful to community energy groups considering new approaches and also to other community businesses considering action on energy and climate issues.
The Next Generation programme supported survey research with 205 members of three community energy groups to explore the difference that community energy made to their lives.
Our 2020 annual report reviews the sixth year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and our future plans, alongside a financial review of 2020 and our statutory accounts.
Building our social infrastructure: why levelling up means creating a more socially connected Britain
This paper examines the role that community organisations can play in the government’s levelling up agenda.
Looking at performance in meeting the needs of minoritised ethnic communities and reviewing what is already known about those needs from existing research.
Power to Change commissioned LSE Consulting to explore the role that private sector developers can play in supporting greater community involvement on our high streets and in our town centres.
With a new £20m injection of funding from TNLCF, we're outlining our plans for the next five years to be a catalyst for the community business sector, putting them at the heart of a fair recovery.
These Clubs are Ours: Putting football into community hands, calls for government to put a Community Club Ownership Trust at the heart of football reform.
The Power to Change report Take Back the High Street set out the case for the greater involvement of communities in the oversight and revitalisation of their high streets.
Our 2019 annual report reviews the fifth year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and ...
This working paper, commissioned by Power to Change in March 2020, looks at examples of community businesses operating in high street or town centre locations across the UK and draws out lessons from their experience.
Power to Change’s Homes in Community Hands (HCH) programme provides grants to help build and refurbish affordable housing. Specifically, the programme is supporting the development of community-led housing (CLH) in England and has been allocated £7.6 million to do this. Between 2016 to 2018 £1.8 million in grants was disbursed in a vanguard phase of the programme. Between 2019 and 2021 up to £5.8 million additional funding will be made available. These funds will be predominantly targeted at five areas in England, but funding will also be available to support innovative projects anywhere in the country. The programme is being evaluated by a team of leading academics in this field. Over the course of the next three years the evaluation team will assess the impact of the HCH programme on various stakeholders and beneficiaries, whilst also capturing important learning to inform the practice of CLH enablers, CLH groups and other organisations including funders like Power to Change. This report presents findings from Year One of the evaluation, setting a baseline picture for the programme, and sharing early lessons on the formation and activity of enabling hubs.
This paper presents interim evaluation findings about parts of the Next Generation programme, covering the processes used and early outcomes.
This report reviews the existing evidence on the importance of volunteering to community businesses and derives estimates of the overall economic value of volunteering to community businesses.
This paper explores the funding landscape for community businesses. In doing so, it also explores what is distinctive about Power to Change’s offering, so that it can plan for its eventual exit from the market.
Packed with information, case studies, checklists, templates and practical tools, The Community Hub Handbook is a new, free resource that sets out how to run a thriving community hub and ensure its future is secure.
This report explores how high streets have declined and puts forward our recommendations for greater community ownership.
Our 2018 annual report reviews the fourth year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and ...
This is the fourth in Power to Change’s series of annual reports on the community business market. This year’s report reviews the structure, size and shape of the community business market in England in 2018 and considers the outlook for the year ahead.
Drawing on the views and experiences of more than 40 community businesses and 20 experts, Community Business in 2030 illustrates the transformative effect the sector could have on both local people’s lives and society as a whole.
This working paper was produced as part of an evaluation and learning review of Power to Change’s Community Business Fund, led by Renaisi. This paper takes some of the learning from the evaluation of the Community Business Fund, and other work, and applies it to wider questions about community businesses, the places that they exist in and how those two things interact.
Our 2017 annual report reviews the third year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and ...
Power to Change commissioned a team from the University of Westminster, Delft University of Technology and Stockholm University to carry out a comparative study of community-based social enterprise (CBSE) in England, the Netherlands and Sweden. National policy was reviewed and three case studies were selected from each country, in order to provide an evidence base for making comparisons and drawing out more general conclusions about the development of the sector.
Each year, the Power to Change Research Institute commissions research to estimate the size and shape of the community business sector in England. This year’s report considers the structure, size and shape of the community business market in England in 2017 and considers the outlook for the year ahead. The report follows on from those of 2014, 2015 and 2016, and presents the most accurate portrait to date of the size and shape of the community business market, as a result of innovations in methodology and an increased use of secondary data for triangulation.
At the end of 2016, the Bank of England’s Chief Economist warned that regional inequality was ‘among the most important issues that we face today as a country’. Then as now, local economies in different parts of the UK were growing at an uneven rate, and some were simply not growing at all. Can hyper-local, socially-responsible businesses help the economic performance of the place where they are based? As part of this work, this paper specifically asks which factors are associated with growth in the sort of start-up, entrepreneurial businesses which can power a local economy.
This report will help community businesses understand the factors through which they can measure their success.
Power to Change is an independent trust, with a mission to increase the number and social impact of community businesses across England.
In 2016 we pledged to make available our grants data. We believe that anyone who wishes should be able to see the grants and investments made by Power to Change, where in the country we have spent our money, and the sort of enterprises in which we have invested.
Our 2016 annual report reviews the second year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the grants we made and ...
The Power to Change Research Institute commissioned Social Finance in July 2016 to provide an updated assessment of the state of the community business market. This follows 'What if we ran it ourselves?' and 'The State of the Community Business Market'
Our 2015 annual report reviews the first year of Power to Change’s operations. It covers the initial grants we ...
The Power to Change Research Institute commissioned Social Finance in September 2015 to provide an updated assessment of the state of the community business market