More than £120,000 was raised through our community share offer, which is a significant amount of money and we are incredibly grateful to the community for getting us to that point.

The community share offer was part of a wider funding package needed to create the Joiners Heart. Alongside the share sale we secured funding from Foundation for Future London, Co-operatives UK, City Bridge Foundation, the Mayor of London, and the Clothworkers Foundation, we also secured a loan from Co-operative and Community Finance. 

Bringing together funding from different sources was always part of our plan to help secure, fit out and open the venue, rather than entirely relying on money raised by the community.

It has funded the huge amount of work needed to turn an empty building into the Joiners Heart. This includes our architect team and materials, community design days, hiring our General Manager, replacing the flooring, gutting and repairing parts of the venue following the discovery of a leak and black mould, carpentry, electrical and plumbing work, ventilation systems and digging out the floor to install an accessible ramp and accessible toilets.

We recognise that people gave their money because they wanted to see a finished accessible queer space come to life, and we know this is frustrating, we’re frustrated too. We will continue to work on developing and improving our space. 

We are actively working to turn that investment into a venue that can sustain itself for the long term.

Our detailed financial projections on the anticipated costs (and a risk register which we are following) were set out in our business plan and community share offer document that we released in 2022, our original forecasts largely remain accurate.

Finances documents:

• Business Plan

• Business Plan Appendices

Rather than keeping the doors closed, we made the decision to open them, knowing that the space wasn’t finished. This means we can run events, bring in the community and start building finances to support the space’s future.

We also continue to work behind the scenes applying for various funding pots (so if you see any you think could help please do send them over friendsjoinersarms@gmail.com).

Once we secure more funding/income, we’ll begin Stage Two of the build and continue working towards the venue we always envisioned.

We are a Community Benefit Society, which means volunteering will always form part of how our organisation operates. Our Society rules stipulate that our Management Committee cannot be paid for those roles, for example.

Members of the Management Committee and friends of the campaign have additionally volunteered to cover bar shifts as a short-term solution to enable us to build up the revenue to put the bar on a more stable financial footing. Much of the work we are now recruiting an Assistant General Manager to undertake is also currently being covered through collective volunteer hours.

A huge amount of volunteer time has also gone into our regular community co-build days. These have given people the opportunity to actively take part in creating a new queer venue, contribute their skills, learn new ones and build something together. The Joiners Heart has grown out of decades of queer organising and community action, and that spirit of people choosing to come together to create something for their community remains fundamental in what we’re building.

We recognise that volunteering to cover paid roles isn’t sustainable or in line with our ethics, and it’s one of the reasons paid roles are so important.

There has also been real value in members of our Management Committee spending time behind the bar. Helping us in understanding some of the key challenges and experiences of what working at the Joiners Heart really involves, which will inform (and improve) how we hire bar staff in the future. 

And from the FOTJA team currently writing these FAQ’s - we volunteer because we LOVE this collective and what it stands for and even when we have a fully staffed venue, you will probably still see a lot of us wanting to volunteer for some bar shifts. It brings us joy. So please come say hi and buy a drink.

Yes!

We have been transparent in job descriptions that our aim is to move all roles involved in the operation of the bar to PAYE within one year.

We understand the calls for us to make that transition a contractual commitment within a fixed timeframe. At this stage, however, we don’t want to make a contractual promise that we cannot be certain we will be in a financial position to keep. Our intention is absolutely to move towards PAYE as soon as we sustainably can, and creating greater security for the people working at the Joiners Heart will remain an important part of our planning as the venue develops.

We hear you. There are so many different aspects to what makes a space accessible.

From the beginning, one of the things we wanted to create was a wheelchair-accessible, queer, community-run venue, something that has been desperately missing. Accessibility has been part of the conversation throughout the process of bringing the Joiners Heart to life, and it will continue to be as the space develops.

Accessibility for us is not a fixed destination, and we would never claim to have created a space that is perfectly accessible to everyone. We are aware that fully accessible doesn't exist, but we are working hard to create a space that is as accessible as possible within our means, for the people who visit the Joiners Heart and for the people who work here.

We commit to continuing to listen, learn and improve as we go. We welcome people telling us where we can do better, while also asking for some understanding that we are a community-led project finding our feet, working with limited resources and trying to turn a decade of campaigning into a sustainable permanent queer space.

We might never be perfect, but we will keep trying to do better.

We plan to offer the chance for more people to become shareholders in early 2027.

As per the terms of the share offer in 2022, 7.5% of total shares can be withdrawn each year from year 5 of operating onwards (likely to be 2030). We do not offer interest on the shares, and shareholders do not receive a share of any profits. Instead, surplus money made from the bar, after paying rent and staff, will be reinvested in the space to offer more to the community. Please see the FAQs from page 20 onwards here. 

All shareholders will be notified when we start advertising roles and we will announce on social media. You do not have to be a shareholder to work at the space.