CoTech summer gathering at Selgar's Mill.
Update 27/04
Poll extended until Friday 30th as requested by @Autonomic Co-operative. New text in orange, outdated text crossed out.
Update 22/04
Proposal has been updated following discussion below. New text in red, outdated text crossed out.
Poll has been closed and a new one opened :)
Background
@Sion Whellens (Principle Six/Calverts) first raised the idea of joining the CoTech gathering together with the Worker Co-op weekend on the forum here and it was discussed further at the CoTech Spring Gathering where we decided to run a poll to gauge interest.
The Worker Co-op Weekend will be running from Friday 22nd July - Sunday 25th July at Selgar's Mill, the space which is now being managed by Stir to Action. The CoTech gathering would be on the Friday during the day, meaning we would need to arrive on Thursday 21st evening, which means extending the booking at Selgar's Mill by a night at a cost of £1500 (inc of 5% VAT). This cost includes accommodation (camping and in rooms) and facilities (cooking, internet etc, washrooms) but not food.
It seems like at least 9 people are interested in attending (the poll was only live for a week), and the majority of respondents to the poll (4/8) felt that we should use the CoTech fund to cover the cost of the extra night at Selgar's Mill, plus food/drink for the Friday night/Thursday day.
The Worker Co-op weekend will continue on from Friday night - Sunday.
Motivation
It would be very nice to see people in person
Selgar's Mill looks amazing and it would be great to support Stir to Action
A more integrated worker co-op movement is a stronger one, this will encourage members to participate in the Worker Co-op weekend and form connections there
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Covering the cost with the fund means people are more likely to be able to join, particularly after a potentially difficult year. This will also hopefully go some way towards addressing the travel cost/time to Devon.
Proposal
We commit to covering the cost of an extra night at Selgar's Mill (which will be a maximum of £1500) and the cost of food and drink for the Thursday night and Friday day time, estimated at £200 if it is not covered by ticket prices. Tickets will be sold via Co-ops UK at an equivalent price per night to the Worker Co-op weekend, which hasn't been confirmed yet but the prices from the last one were £66 for 2 nights camping, £84 for 2 nights in a room. which is as follows:
Camping (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £60 + VAT for members and £85 for non-members
Dorm (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £80 + VAT for members and £115 for non-members
Private room (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £100 + VAT for members and £145 for non-members
Saturday daytime only - £30 + VAT for members and £43 for non-members
They have agreed to give us a ticket to cover Friday night and Saturday day for the camping option only, at around £45 for members.
Accommodation - both camping and in dorms/rooms. As we will be there first, all the rooms will be available on the Thursday night. However, we don't want to be blocking them all throughout the weekend if people are staying on - so there are some logistics to be managed there.
Food - there are ample cooking facilities at the venue so we can cook throughout the evening/day, with enough willing volunteers. (I would love to hear if people are willing to do this or not. Otherwise, we can order food or go to the pub, but the budget might not totally cover that). Any surplus from ticket sales will go towards the catering costs and we can create another proposal re. how to manage food there. Any surplus beyond that would go back into the CoTech fund.
Timeframe
We need to let Co-ops UK know our decision as they will add it on the their booking form, making it easier for us all. So a short timeframe is necessary, and the poll closes in a week.
Please...
Ask any clarifying questions
Raise any critical concerns
Vote in the poll if you are a contributor of the CoTech fund
Comment below with suggestions/questions/volunteering to cook etc etc.
Lucy King Wed 21 Apr 2021 12:25PM
The breakdown is - £1500 for the venue hire, max £200 for dinner Thursday, breakfast and lunch on Friday - very much guesstimated based on previous gatherings. Sorry if that sounds obtuse as I'm basically just repeating the above! Very happy to provide more clarity if you let me know where it's missing?
Nick Greenhill (Co-op Web) Wed 21 Apr 2021 1:17PM
Hi Lucy, so just to confirm. From a pot of £3,505.07, the proposal is asking for £1,700 which would cover a stay at Selgar's Mill and food and drink?
If that's correct I guess my questions would be:
- How many rooms would this provide for CoTech members?
- What would happen if more CoTech members requested rooms than were available?
Or are we saying that this £1,500 is just for the venue and doesn't cover the cost to stay over? If this is the case, how many people from CoTech would be committed to going? Basically would it be value for money for the CoTech, or would we end up paying £1,500 for four or five people to get together (which we could obviously do a lot cheaper if that's the case)
Sorry if I'm fundamentally missing a point here, my brain is a bit fried juggling a few bits but aware of the tight deadline so didn't want to miss the opportunity to clarify.
Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) Wed 21 Apr 2021 1:43PM
The £1,500 covers the cost of the whole venue for 24 hours, this includes:
Nine bedrooms which sleep 20 in total.
Half-acre camping field with room for 30 tents.
See the plan and the PDF brochure, but this cost doesn't cover food. However if either of the other two proposed events on the same day take place the costs and amount of accommodation would be reduced, we might need at least half the people to camp if this is the case, but since it's summer and that might not be a problem, I'd rather camp.
If there were 20 people paying £40 for the night for a bed in a room and 35 people paying £20 a night to pitch a tent that would cover the £1,500, there might not be enough CoTech people for some figures like this to work out but there are the two other groups that might also be there as well, it will be interesting to see what the prices are for the Workers Co-op Weekend.
Nick Greenhill (Co-op Web) Wed 21 Apr 2021 1:48PM
cool, thanks Chris. Not trying to be difficult...promise! :-)
Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) Wed 21 Apr 2021 1:58PM
Not a problem Nick, the concerns you and @Aaron Hirtenstein (Agile Collective) have raised are legitimate and need addressing.
Lucy King Wed 21 Apr 2021 2:43PM
Yes, totally! thanks for adding those details @Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative)
Chris Lowis (Go Free Range) Thu 22 Apr 2021 2:15PM
55 people attending from CoTech feels like it might be a bit of a stretch given the current engagement. Do we have any sense yet of how many people might attend? I think it's quite unlikely that I will due to family commitments.
Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) Thu 22 Apr 2021 2:33PM
My feeling is that there are probably around a dozen keen people at the moment, however if the Covid situation doesn't take a turn for the worse then based on past events I'd guess that we might have a turn out of around 30 or 40 people, it is also possible that things go well Covid wise -- with all restrictions removed and a good weather forecast we might have more?
Lucy King Wed 21 Apr 2021 12:27PM
Hello all, sounds like there are some critical concerns. I made the original proposal based on the CoTech forum poll, where people voted for this option (admittedly, there were not that many responses) - so it would be good to hear from them.
Very happy to update the proposal to try to address the critical concerns, but perhaps @Nick Greenhill (Co-op Web) and @Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) you could state more explicitly what they are, so that I make sure I meet them when I refactor the proposal? E.g. @Nick Greenhill (Co-op Web) is it a critical concern for you if the fund is used to cover any catering costs, or is there a limit that you'd be more comfortable with? For example, if we asked members to buy tickets, we could propose CoTech makes up any difference in both venue hire and catering costs. If we are going to cook together, it does seem to make sense to have a central fund to cover it. We have previously covered extra catering costs out of the fund (for the Newcastle gathering).
Nick Greenhill (Co-op Web) · Wed 21 Apr 2021 8:52AM
Really torn about this.
Obviously we really want to support the CoTech and if that includes contributing to people being able to attend gatherings to help grow and extend the network fantastic. However, our membership was very clear when I first approached them about contributing to the fund, we're happy to contribute as long as it's for the benefit of the CoTech and not just used for 'parties and booze'. I know this proposal is a little more involved than that in truth, but I'm not sure how comfortable our members would be with it.
I feel like the funds would be better used supporting members who have struggled due to the pandemic than a meet-up weekend. Particularly at the moment when I think a lot of people would be put off a face to face gathering (I know I would)
That said I'm not sure I completely grasp the financial ask of the proposal, as reading the initial proposal I felt we were talking a big chunk of money, however from what Chris says maybe it's not that much? A clearer breakdown of the amount being asked would definitely help.
Sorry if I'm missing the point, I generally stay out of the finance discussions as trust there's people here who know much better when it comes to distribution of the money, but this one just doesn't feel right.