Thank you for your interest in Community Connect.
Community Connect gives Scotmid members the opportunity to make a difference in their communities. More information can be found here
Every time a member makes a purchase in store they will receive a community connect vote. Members then use their votes at member meetings to allocate financial awards of up to £15,000 to Community Groups. Applications are now closed for this cycle.
Scotmid’s Community Connect Award is available to community groups and projects across our trading areas in Scotland.
Our selection panel will shortlist 3 projects that:
- benefit the local community centred around Scotmid or Semichem stores
- have the a big impact in their community
- Will cost in the region £15,000 to complete
- Are scheduled to be completed within 24 months of the award date
All three member areas in Scotland – North, East and West will each shortlist three good cause groups who are looking for funding in their relevant geographical area. All three of the Good Causes shortlisted in each geographical area will receive a share of £25,000. The funds will be allocated £15,000, £5,000 and £5,000 – based on the votes received. Funding awards will be made in October 2024.
By sending us your Application, you’re agreeing to these terms and conditions, so please read them before you apply. Important: Once you’ve submitted your Application, you can’t make any changes.
Good Cause Group Eligibility
Your cause and your Initiative needs to be in keeping with Scotmid’s co-operative values and principles and benefit communities within the geographic boundaries of a Scotmid or Semichem store.
We prioritise projects which fall broadly into one of the following categories:
- Children & Youth
- 65+ Group
- Community Group
- Social Inclusion
- Health & Wellbeing
- Environment
- Arts & Culture
- Active Lifestyles
- Fairtrade and ethical issues
- Co-operative
We’ll only consider one Application per organisation (or Applicant) per Award Cycle (usually six months, but it can vary). This means we won’t consider multiple applications from the same organisation or person in an Award Cycle for different local communities within the same geographical area. An individual can only make one application per cycle. If you have had already made an application that was unsuccessful we ask that you wait 12 months before applying again (even if it’s a different project) And we won’t consider any Applications which involve:
- Promoting any political activities or causes
- Promoting any religious beliefs (but we will consider Projects led by religious organisations, if they’re for the good of the whole community)
- Exclusively pay salaries or other running costs (rent, energy etc.)
- Making grants to other people or organisations
- Where the Applicant is not directly involved / employed by the applying organisation
- Projects that have already happened or will be finished before we make any award
- Projects that public authorities (for example, local authorities or NHS) are responsible for (this includes council leisure services or libraries)
- The same applicant has applied for two or more organisations
- The group does not have a bank account. We won’t pay funds into an individuals personal account
- Sponsored events
- Individual or Team sponsorship / bursaries
- Overseas Projects
- Applications from charities that are currently or have been Scotmid’s Charity of the Year covering a three year period
- A group which has received funding (actual or in-kind) of more than £3000 in the last three years from Scotmid
- Projects which, in our opinion, could harm the reputation of the Scotmid or the Scotmid Community Connect Programme.
Good Cause Group Shortlisting
By submitting the Application you’re applying for a Scotmid Community Connect Award, and accept that you will not receive any funding if your group is not one of the three shortlisted applications. The decision of Scotmid and the Selection Panel is final.
If we need any more information from you, we’ll email you at the email addresses in your Application.
After we’ve reviewed all the Applications, a regional shortlisting panel (consisting of elected members and employees) will invite up to six good cause groups to come along to a meeting to discuss the application in more detail. The meetings will take place in September/October 2024, ideally in person but they may be held via a video call. Following this meeting three groups will be shortlisted to receive a share of the £25,000.
By completing the Community Connect Application Form you are agreeing to send a representative from your group to the relevant meeting with the regional shortlisting panel. If a representative cannot attend this meeting (either in person or via a video call) we can make alternative arrangements to conduct and record a telephone discussion however this is at the discretion of the relevant Scotmid Selection Panel.
All shortlisted groups must agree to:
- Provide us with any other material / imagery to help us promote your group as one of the shortlisted good cause groups in the relevant Scotmid membership region.
- Bring along at least 5 members to support your group attending our regional member meeting where you will host an information stand and present a short (5 mins) summary of your group and initiative to the assembled members to help them decide who to vote for
- Acknowledge fully Scotmid wherever possible in all subsequent publicity relating to the funds you receive.
- Co-operate with us in any future publicity.
- Co-operate with us on monitoring and reporting progress of your project.
Unfortunately, due to the large number of applications we anticipate, we are unable to give individual feedback on an application.
Timescales
The timescales for this cycle of Community Connect Awards are as follows;
| Award Cycle / Year | Financial Awards made at OGM 2024 (Sept/Oct) | |
| Applications open | Monday 22nd January 2024 | |
| Applications close | 7th March 2024 @ 5pm | |
| Selection Panel Meeting | April 2024 | |
| 3 groups shortlisted | April 2024 | |
| Successful groups photoshoot | TBC | |
| Collection of Votes opens | May 2024 | |
| Collection of votes closes | September 2024 | |
| Members meeting (OGM) | To be confirmed
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| Financial Awards Made | October 2024 |
Shortly after the relevant members meeting, your Community Connect Award will be send by bank transfer to a bank account which must be in your organisation’s registered name.
Community Connect Awards and the Awards Process
If your group is selected as one of the three shortlisted good cause groups, any award you get from us is subject to the following terms and conditions.
Our contract with you
- Your application is approved when we write to you to confirm that you have been selected as one of the Community Connect Shortlisted Groups (which may be by email).
- By submitting your application you’re agreeing to be bound by these terms and conditions.
What you agree
- Only you can spend your Award. You can only use it to carry out your initiative, which must be for non-profit purposes and for the good of the community.
- The amount we provide is final and will not be increased.
- Funds will be paid following the AGM which will take place in May 2024
- You agree to act in good faith (for example, you agree not to give us false, inaccurate or misleading information about your Group and Initiative or use your Award for anything other than the information you have detailed in your application).
- If you do not spend all the Award provided on the project as specified in your application, you must inform us and we reserve the right to request any unspent money to be returned to us.
- Funds must be paid into the bank account with the same name as the details on the application form.
- Scotmid Co-operative will not be responsible for any expenditure you incur during the Award Cycle in relation to accumulating votes or attending photocalls, events or meetings.
- If any of the Society’s assets (such as marketing materials) have been provided to you, you must return them to a mutually agreeable and convenient location
- The decision of the regional Selection Panel and members vote is final. There is no right of appeal.
- 8.You agree:
- To keep clear and accurate records, showing exactly what you’ve spent your Award on – and share them with us if we ask you to
- To get whatever permissions you need (consents or approvals) before carrying out your Project, keeping them up to date and complying with them.
Progress reports
- We’ll ask you to report who benefits from your project and how it’s making a difference to their lives. You agree to give these reports to us promptly, in the form we’ve asked for.
- We may use your reports for reporting purposes or to publicise the Scotmid Community Connect Award.
- If we ask to meet with your officers or agents, they must agree to our request within a reasonable timeframe, as long as we give you reasonable notice.
- You must also give us any extra information or documents we ask for (within reason) to prove that you’ve used your Award in line with these terms and conditions.
- Once the initiative is complete, you have to submit a post project report, in the form we’ve asked for. We may also ask you for updates from time to time.
Publicity and marketing
- We’ll publicise the successfully shortlisted Good Cause Groups online and in store, as part of our Scotmid Community Connect promotion. You agree that we can use any of the information and images you’ve given us in any of our publicity or marketing materials – either within Scotmid Co-operative (members, staff and customers), or externally (the media, or the general public).
- You agree that we can edit or change the wording of any written content you give us, to fit with our branding and tone of voice guidelines.
- You agree to follow our brand guidelines (which we’ll give you) whenever you mention Community Connect in your own publicity or marketing. If you give us any photographs, logos, trademarks or other intellectual property rights, you grant us a worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual licence to use, publish and reproduce them – in any media, anywhere in the world.
- For any photos, logos, trademarks or other intellectual property rights you give us, you warrant and represent that:
- You – and only you – own them
- You have the right to give us the licence to use them
- You have the permission of anyone who appears in a photo that we can use it
- If any person in a photo is under 18, you have their parent or legal guardian’s permission that we can use it
- They don’t infringe on anyone else’s intellectual property rights.
Ending our contract
- Our contract with you will continue until you’ve spent all the money we’ve given you on the Project, and we’ve finished doing any marketing around it.
- We may choose not to pay you any or all of your Award or recover the Award and/or end our contract with you immediately if:
(i)You break or do not abide by any of these terms and conditions
(ii)You stop trading or can’t pay your debts (for example, if you go into liquidation or come to an arrangement with your creditors)
(iii)You do something we think could do serious damage to our brand, our reputation or goodwill (whether it’s connected to the Project or not)
Taking your Award back
We have the right to ask you to pay back all or any part of your Award, if we think:
- You’ve spent all or part of it on anything other than the information that was detailed in your application
- You’ve used it in a way that goes against the aims of the Scotmid Community Connect Award or these terms and conditions.
- The project is not completed within the known and agreed timescales
- We believe that the project breaches or breaks any of the criteria laid out in these terms and conditions
Your data
- All the information and data you give us (including personal data as defined by the Data Protection Act 1998) about the Initiative will still belong to you (or your licensors), but you agree that we and our agents have the right to use it however we choose (for example: statistical analysis, market research, marketing and publicity, or auditing).
- Before you pass data on to us, you need to tell whoever the data is about that we (and anyone working for us) will be able to see it and use it, and get their consent for that.
Other things you should know
- Whenever we’re doing any marketing we’ll:
- Act responsibly, in line with the relevant laws and regulations – and, where appropriate, any guidelines.
- Make sure all our members have access to full and unbiased information around the Scotmid Community Connect Award
- Make sure the way we do our publicity doesn’t (within reason) intrudes on anyone’s privacy.
- You understand that we can only guarantee to pay you your Award as long as there are enough funds in the Community Connect Award fund and as long as we continue to run the programme.
- The application form must be completed by the organisation who will benefit from the funding. We will not accept applications from third party companies, agencies or consultancies.
- You can’t transfer any part of the Award out of the United Kingdom or any of your rights under it to any other organisation or person – unless you have our permission, in writing, to work with them to carry out the Initiative
- We won’t accept any changes to these terms and conditions, unless we’ve agreed them in writing.
- Wherever we’ve mentioned giving notice or giving you information in these terms and conditions, we’ll always do this in writing. We prefer to do this by email to the addresses provided in your Application. If we do it by email, we’ll assume you’ve got it at the start of the next working day (as long as it hasn’t bounced back).
- These terms and conditions and the documents we’ve mentioned in them (including the Application form) contain everything we’ve agreed with you about the Community Connect Award.
If a court decides that part of these terms and conditions aren’t enforceable in law, then the remaining terms and conditions shall remain in full force and effect.
We can change or vary these terms and conditions at any time.
Words with particular meanings
In these terms and conditions:
Application means the form you filled in and submitted to us, asking us for funding
Award Cycle means the period of time between applications open and our member meeting where registered members will cast their votes for the Good Cause Group and Initiative they want to support (usually six months, but it can vary)
Award means the money we give you
Initiative means the idea, project or programme you’ve described in your Application
We, us, our means Scotmid Co-operative and our affiliates, including our employees and family of businesses
You and your means the UK registered charity, community group or other organisation you’ve named in your Application.
You can contact us at:
If you prefer to send us a letter, or you need to give us official or legal notice, please write to us at:
Membership Team
Scotmid Co-operative
2 Harvest Drive
Newbridge
Hillwood House
EH28 8QJ
0131 335 4433