Cletwr - a community-owned rural service hub

Many rural places are losing their local services, from shops and banks, to meeting places. Community‐owned social enterprises can open new possibilities. Cities benefit from agglomeration: there are shops and the people to shop in them; services and the people to use them. But, in rural locales, shops are struggling to stay open and services are being centralised further and further afield. A recent report from the Prince’s Countryside Fund (Skerratt 2018) found that people in rural Britain are feeling increasingly remote – geography has not changed, but infrastructure and services have. Community ownership is one model that can enable rural shops and facilities to stay open, and even expand their services into local hubs. Cletwr, a community‐owned shop and café in Mid Wales, is an excellent example. In 2019, Cletwr won the rural social enterprise of the year award at the UK‐wide Rural Business Awards.