Spark Ignition: week ten

Hello all, I hope you are enjoying the start to the summer? It’s been a busy few weeks on Spark.

The social enterprise finalists are now on the home stretch towards their presentation to win a share of the Spark prizes. There are just two weeks to go until they will join the panel and project partners at an event in Leicester – the first in a two step process to awarding the £500,000 prize fund and other prizes.

In this update we share some regrettable news about one of the finalists, Assisi House Project, which has withdrawn from pitching. We also introduce the Spark panel; you can read the third piece in our ’10 steps to a successful social enterprise’ series and we have an up-lifting first-person story from Steven Farrell, a former Social services manager, who worked with The Big Issue Foundation – one of Britain’s most high-profile social enterprises - to get off the streets.

If you have any questions or feedback, please don’t hesitate to email me on info@sparkchallenge.org.

Regards Richard Litchfield and the Spark team.

What have the finalists been up to?

Assisi House Project

Regretfully, by mutual agreement, we have scaled back our work with one of the Spark finalists, Assisi House Project.

After deliberation the Assisi team agreed that the organisation was not going to be ready to be able to be considered for investment by the end of May. Therefore, Assisi will not be vying for a share of the Spark prizes.

We are currently looking at other ways we can help the growing organisation with funding and development in order to the cement the work its team has already done.

Next steps for finalists

The 14 other Spark finalists are now in the last stage of the Investment readiness programme working towards presenting their business case to the project’s panel on May 28 and 29 – at an event in Leicester.

At the event, Spark Ignition, they will vie for a share of £500,000 from Communities and Local Government and thousands of pounds worth of other Spark prizes.

Spark Ignition will be an opportunity for the panel, the project’s partners and the finalists to get to know each other, to learn from each others’ presentations and to share ideas on how to build social enterprise to tackle homelessness.

Spark Ignition will be followed by a second afternoon event, Spark Action, which will he held in London on June 11. There, the Junior Minister for Housing, Iain Wright will announce the split of prizes among the 14 finalists.

Spark panel

It is with pleasure that I introduce the Spark panel:

John Montague
Chief executive, The TREES Group (Spark partner)
Spark panel (Chairman)

Nigel Kershaw
Chief executive, Big Issue Invest (Spark partner)
Chairman, The Big Issue group

Maff Potts
Specialist adviser on homelessness, Communities and Local Government (Spark partner)

Philip Wright
Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers (Spark corporate partner)

Damian Southworth
Group commercial director, Places for People (Spark corporate partner)

Douglas Johnson-Poensgen
Director, Strategy & Transformation, BT Public Sector (Spark corporate partner)

Please find more information about each panelist on the Spark Who's who? page.

10 steps to a successful social enterprise

STEP 3. Know your numbers
Do you know who your clients are? How do you know that they would pay for your service? Who are your competitors? How much will you charge for your services and why?

Want to learn more? Full article online.

Case study

Steven Farrell, a beneficiary of The Big Issue Foundation
Former Social services manager Steven Farrell tells his story of working with The Big Issue Foundation after the breakdown of his marriage led him to sleeping rough on the streets of London, Brighton and Canterbury.

Read more case studies of people who have benefited from working with social enterprises tackling homelessness on the Spark website.