Recognised for their community contribution by creating a ‘virtual woodland’ for high risk clients during lockdown, The Cart Shed Charity have been named as one of the British Chambers of Commerce UK Business Heroes!
In September, the Charity was awarded with the ‘Accomplishments in Adaptability Award’ at the Herefordshire & Worcestershire Chamber of Commerce Chamber Champions Awards, celebrating a business who had risen to the challenge by innovating and diversifying during these turbulent times and begun a fruitful new journey with an exciting direction and vision. As a result of this, they were nominated for a BCC Business Heroes Award and were selected to be featured as a case study.
The Cart Shed Charity created a ‘virtual woodland’ in response to Coronavirus, enabling the charity to continue to support over 100 individuals during lockdown. Their team of traditional craftspeople and occupational therapists, familiar with ancient woodcraft tools such as billhooks, froes, shave horses and pole lathes, found themselves having to learn how to use digital solutions to maintain contact with the people the charity supports. Finding themselves in a critical situation, due to the high risk of suicide and self-harm amongst their clients, The Cart Shed had to create – at speed – a meaningful, purposeful programme that delivered a service which replicated what normally happened in the woods.
Having never delivered anything in the virtual environment, their team worked together to create a system that would work for those clients with very few IT skills. Many of their participants have limited or no access to IT, so they had to use systems the majority were familiar with. As such they developed a range of courses and set up a closed Facebook group for participants to access them. They also delivered activity packs to people’s homes across the county.
The Cart Shed Charity demonstrated that with ingenuity and access to basic technology, they could offer a first-class remote mental health ‘therapeutic woodland’ service to their existing client group and those who couldn’t previously access their service. They are now in the process of developing and enhancing their Virtual Woodland Therapeutic Programme, to enable them to maintain a service for those who continue to self-isolate, or who are unable to attend real life woodland sessions. This new service will extend their reach as they will be able to offer a county-wide service.
More generally they are working with health commissioners to see how best to implement these programmes for the benefit of the whole community, and eventually how this model could be replicated beyond Herefordshire.
Katie Eastaugh, CEO of The Cart Shed Charity said:
“Since the Chamber’s nomination, we’ve received funding from HM Government and the Lottery to develop our innovative ad-hoc virtual woodland therapeutic service; exciting opportunities for Herefordshire in challenging times.”
Sharon Smith, CEO of the Herefordshire & Worcestershire Chamber of Commerce said:
“The Cart Shed have adapted in every single way and under the most difficult of circumstances. Not only have they had to change their business model, operation, and service delivery, but they have had to support and train staff and service users in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
“Their entire desire to adapt has been to save lives. Their business is essential to the wellbeing and often survival of service users and so they have adapted everything within their power to ensure that they support the people most in need.
“We cannot commend them highly enough. Any adaptation in business is impressive, but one which preserves life, it astounding.”
Recognising businesses. One story at a time
The British Chambers of Commerce are proud to recognise Business Heroes across the UK.
We launched the campaign earlier this month to recognise the incredible work that UK businesses are doing, in the most challenging of years. We’re pleased to say that we’ve received some fantastic stories about businesses and individuals across the UK.
We’re paying tribute to them and recognising their contributions by giving them our UK Business Heroes stamp which demonstrates that that they have gone the extra mile to support their local community during the Coronavirus outbreak.
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