Community

We underestimated the power of community when we first moved our coffee roastery to Morecambe Bay.

After a year of settling in, we opened a coffee shop in the area we lived. It has since become something of a community space. That was always the intention, but you can never fully predict how these things will take shape once people begin to inhabit them.

Before the coffee shop, we had hosted numerous events at the roastery, giving us a glimpse of how community life might be developed. I’ll admit I had grand ideas — blue-sky thinking with no budget to match. But with time, patience, and some steep learning curves, we found our way. What exists now is our version of community engagement.

It comes from a place of promoting wellbeing and participation. Of being bold, trying new things, and occasionally getting carried away with the philosophy of what it really means to be bold. We used to joke that the antithesis of Fuelling the Bold was the Flat Track Bully, but the real journey has been about delayed gratification, moving forward slowly and understanding our role within the community we serve.

For us, community engagement looks like a full events calendar: free, inclusive, wellbeing-focused gatherings that invite people from the local area and beyond to take part. It also looks like coffee that creates space for conversation, for connection, or simply for a pause for thought.

Bold has become a place people return to. Even if the connection between the coffee that started it all and the experience people have isn’t always explicit, it’s embedded in the DNA of what we do. In truth, it’s all been a big experiment - good intentions matched with plenty of action. I’ve always believed it’s better to go too far than not far enough. Remember Bold as the place where everything starts with a conversation.

I’m incredibly grateful that Carringtons has an outlet where it can live and breathe what it truly hopes to achieve.

Along the way, we also discovered something we hadn’t fully anticipated: the direct value of being a local employer. Providing opportunities to work, to be curious about entrepreneurship, to develop new skills — these things matter deeply to local communities, and they matter to us.

Through many learning experiences (including a few failures), we’ve begun to navigate a clearer path and a more grounded vision for the future. Strengthening community engagement is a balancing act - between business realities, available resources, family life, and personal wellbeing. For Carringtons and Bold to be effective, we need community just as much as it needs us.

Finding the right team has been one of our greatest challenges. Carringtons is the driving force and without coffee and vision, none of this exists. But without a team, it’s physically impossible to achieve what we’re aiming for. We’re now entering an exciting period of camaraderie and shared purpose, and I genuinely believe this is the foundation for deeper, more meaningful community impact.

We love our local community. Trust takes time, but I believe many people understand that we’re here for the long run, that we are part of the place we live and work in.

We also bring that sense of community beyond Morecambe Bay through our pay it forward approach - a simple, transparent framework that allows us to do business in a way that aligns with our values.

Here’s how it works:

Funds generated through coffee sales and the operation of Bold are reinvested directly back into the space. This enables us to host events that are free to attend and to remove cost as a barrier to participation wherever possible.

Alongside this, we fundraise independently for our events arm, Bold CIC, which exists to support and extend this work over time. This structure allows events to repeat, to grow carefully, and to remain accessible without relying on constant promotion or ticketing pressure.

Our aim is sustainability and continuity, to grow ethically and intentionally. By keeping paying it forward modest and circular, we’re able to do more year on year without changing the character of the work, or the space that holds it.