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St Andrews Play Association

The St Andrews Play Association is a purpose built youth building with an adjoining ball court, situated in a city centre park next to Leicester Royal Infirmary.  They provide inclusive and meaningful play activities and opportunities for local children aged 5 to 14, after school and during holidays; creating targeted programs to empower young people to lead healthy and fulfilling lives.

"For 40 odd years the project’s had the mindset of there's only limited things we could do, whereas from what we've just gone through, it's opened up a whole field of possibilities and it will make us think in a way that we've not thought of before and the possibilities that we develop and how would they could be further developed now... it has been a real eye opener.”

Stephen Ashley, Project Manager, St Andrews Play Association 

Celebrate Our Similarities (COS)

COS encourages others to embrace a culture of peace through its work delivering positive action centred on our shared human priorities of ‘Personal Peace’ and ‘Climate’ through research, events, grassroot projects, webinars and facilitation of the Personal Peace Education Programme.

"The Growth Accelerator has been very timely for COS. Our 'why' and 'how' is ready to succinctly reach a wide audience. Our ambition to lead a collaborative to make Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland a 'global exemplar for social impact’ now has the potential to excite a wide range of local groups, organisations and individuals to get behind our ideas.”

Kamla Pattni, Founder Director, Celebrate Our Similarities CIC

Preloved@45

Preloved@45 sells preloved items including clothes, shoes, toys, books and household goods and aims to divert materials from landfill for reuse. The business is a community enterprise and is run co-operatively by, and for, Braunstone residents with the aim of improving the lives of local people. 

“Participating in the Growth Accelerator project put Preloved@45 in touch with new people from many diverse groups and allowed us to jointly share strengths and opportunities, whilst discussing and addressing challenges we are all currently facing as businesses. Our business received support to focus on a succession plan which we knew we needed but had not had opportunity to explore. We also received assistance to diversify within our trading space to open a new café area and develop our online selling portal. The funding day was a bonus and made us aware of many more areas that Preloved@45 could potentially apply to, both now and in the future.”

Marian Deacon, Director, Preloved@45

Jamila's Legacy 

Jamila’s Legacy provides advice, advocacy, support, a listening service, self-care activities and training, to individuals interested in maintaining their own mental health well-being and supporting others.

“We have been through a period of rapid growth and needed a plan to manage our growth and set out clear priorities for the next three years. The strategic planning process enabled us to stop and review our current work streams and income streams, as well as assess the organisation’s strengths, weaknesses, risks and opportunities.  We feel very confident about the future and the plan has given us more structure to deliver and grow our services.”

Rehana Sidat, Project Manager/Director, Jamila's Legacy

Leicester Caribbean Credit Union

LCCU provide accessible and affordable financial solutions, including savings, tailored loans, and life cover, to the local community.  They provide both online and in-person support, offering guidance and advice to help educate individuals on digital and financial literacy.

“We were in desperate need of reviewing our strategic plan and pulling together a sustainability plan that future proofed the organisation for the next 50 years.The strategic planning process brought out new ideas and we were able to reflect on our priorities.  Digital transformation of operations came out as our top priority and we were supported to put a grant application to Fair Finance4All to improve our finance systems infrastructure. We are very hopeful this will be successful.”

Derek Rawles, Compliance Officer/Director, Leicester Caribbean Credit Union