As lockdown restrictions begin to relax, we were excited to finally meet Rebecca in person, and to give her a quick tour of Stroud.

Not to mention having recently been able to pop in to the Future Leap space in Bristol!

Both of these great places got us thinking about the things we love in Stroud & the South West, and we wanted to share some of our favourites on the blog.

1. The Bike Drop & The Access Bike Project

These are two separate (but equally brilliant) local ventures, both supported by Creative Sustainability a Stroud based Community Interest Company, and both taking advantage of pedal power to bring about positive change.

The Bike Drop was formed in response to the COVID 19 pandemic, when a team of young people came together to collect and deliver items locally on bikes. Deliveroo this is not, The Bike Drop offers training and employment opportunities while providing sustainable local delivery for everyone from vegan restaurants, to bakeries, to soap makers.

Supporting local economic growth, Stroud’s commitment to carbon neutrality by 2030, and young people through training and educational opportunities – we love it – if you’re based in the Stroud area check out their live list of deliveries, there’s something there for everyone.

The Access Bike Project was founded in 2015 with the aim of giving everyone the chance to fall in love with cycling, done by refurbishing donated bikes and by giving free access to their workshop – all to help remove financial barriers to owning a bike.

In addition, they run mentoring sessions with disabled and vulnerable young adults, host community events and help develop micro businesses – and much more.

Although the workshop is currently closed due to COVID restrictions, they’ll be back and are always on the look out for bikes for donation!

2. Cotswold Canals Trust

Back in November 2020 the Cotswold Canals Trust were successful in their application for an £8.9 million grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund – and this means that Stroud and Stonehouse are set to become canal towns again for the first time since being formally abandoned in 1954.

The opening up of 4.5 miles of canal will bring huge benefits to the local economy, leisure, community, health, heritage, and the environment. 21 hectares of biodiversity land will be created, as well as 30,000 trees planted.

This is all thanks to an outstanding team of volunteers, and up to 500 more volunteers are expected to help in the coming years. The project has been worked on since 1972 by volunteers determined to open up the canals again, and we can’t wait for this project to be complete and for the benefits it will bring Stroud and Stonehouse!

3. Forest Green Rovers

Despite not being invited to join the European Super League we feel Forest Green Rovers are in a league of their own (sorry) when it comes to sustainability.

If you’re fed up with teams owned by megalomaniacal oil tycoons, multinational conglomerates or human rights abusing royal families, you could do worse than looking for a team in the lower leagues.

Forest Green Rovers are owned by local windmill enthusiast Dale Vince and have a plethora of world firsts under their belt in their quest to become the world’s most sustainable football club.

From vegan only food, to an organic pitch, to bamboo-based kits, everything they do is forward looking, carbon neutral and utterly unique in the world of football.

What’s more they’ve just received approval to build a new stadium made entirely of wood (another world first!), with accompanying business park, and planting of 500 trees and 1.8km of hedgerows to promote biodiversity.

4. The Growth Hub

The Growth Hub is a Gloucestershire-wide network of business centres offering free help and support to business looking for assistance as they grow. The Growth Hub offer online events, workshops and much more.

With funding from the European Regional Development Fund, all of their services are completely free, and they have centres set-up in Cheltenham, Gloucester, Cirencester, and Stroud – with the Forest of Dean soon to follow.

If you’re a start-up business, or a business looking to grow, The Growth Hub represents a great local resource, and we’d encourage you to get in touch! You can see more about what they’ve done for other businesses here.

5. The Long Table

The Long Table is another brilliant Community Interest Company based in Stroud, who with support from The Grace Network (who also helped launch The Bike Drop!) were founded in 2018 to help change the world through food.

Dismayed at how society is doing food so badly, (one third of all food grown and produced is never eaten!) leaving people unwell and lonely, The Long Table was set up to make locally sourced and lovingly prepared food available to everyone, regardless of their social or financial background.

The Long Table focusses on four main areas to help bring about Food Equality:

Community Resilience, putting an end to food poverty and providing great food that is good for the body.
Food Resilience, shortening the distance between farm and plate and making local food available to more people.
Community Food Hall, where all their work comes together to allow people to congregate and combat loneliness at the same time.
Training and work opportunities, through apprenticeships and The Teenage Kitchen, they’re helping young people develop skills and prepare for a career they are excited about!

The Long Table is an amazing cause, doing great work so if you’re able to help in any way at all you’d be helping to make a huge difference!

6. The Prince Albert & Stroud Brewery

As proud Rodborougharians we can’t list our favourite local places without mentioning The Best Pub In The World™ - The Prince Albert.

Run by amazing land-people Lotte and Miles, The Albert serves as the hub of the local community: offering amazing live music, fantastic local beers, and somewhere for people to meet to discuss everything from work, politics, local gossip, and to plan out amazing ventures like the ones we’ve listed here.

We’re delighted to be allowed back in their amazing garden as the lockdown begins to lift, and over the period where their doors were closed, they were able to support the local community through their Pub Food Bank, and through delivering food and drink via The Bike Drop.

You may have seen them on Tom Kerridge’s recent series Saving Britain’s Pubs, which outlined just how hard life is for Britain’s Locals at the moment – so if you’re in Stroud we’d heartily recommend popping up to the pub for a pint of local beer and one of Miles’s homemade Pizzas or Burgers! They even have a crowd-funder you can access here.

What’s more, they’ll probably have a beer on from Stroud Brewery – another amazing local enterprise.

B Corp accredited and with a beautiful location in Brimscombe right on the side of our local canal, Stroud Brewery is a dedicated organic brewery certified by the soil association.

Beer tastes better when it comes from healthy, fertile soil, from a system of farming with wildlife benefits – and if you ever want proof you can pop into the brewery’s garden for a pizza and beer while you think about all the great local things you can find in the South West.

Inardua are a Salesforce consultancy based in Stroud, we’re committed to being run in the right way and are always happy to discuss if we can use the world’s most popular CRM to help your organisation – so if you’d like a chat feel free to drop us a message.