The independent supermarket HiSbe plans to open a second store in Brighton on the site of a former Tesco.
HiSbe – it stands for “How it should be” – wants the next branch of its ethical supermarket business to be in St James’s Street.
The community interest company (CIC) said that it was looking for £190,000 to fund the opening of the Kemp Town store.
Two social business funders are putting up £105,000 and more than £65,000 has been raised from other supporters, leaving £20,000 to find.
The original HiSbe, in York Place, opened in December 2013 after crowdfunding brought in £30,000. Other investors included fair trade pioneer Gordon Roddick, who gave £20,000.
HiSbe asked the community “to get involved with the social enterprise by offering their time, skills or money to bring the new store to life”.
Ruth Anslow, one of HiSbe’s founders, said: “We are proud to announce that HiSbe is set to expand.
“Three years of operating our pilot store has helped prove that you can run a supermarket as a social enterprise and put staff, suppliers and customers before profit.
“We want to get Brightonians involved and encourage them to join the supermarket revolution as HiSbe is first and foremost a store for the local community.
“But we do need help to turn the old Tesco store into HiSbe Kemp Town.
“We invite supporters to contact us to find out how they can help us get our hands on the site and keep out the big chains.
“Core to our values is that suppliers get a fair price and Brighton’s increasing appetite for ethically sourced, sustainable and fairly priced food has allowed the us to bring that fair price policy to even more local suppliers and now to a second store.
“We want to keep millions more pounds in the local economy, we want to create more rewarding Living Wage jobs for more people locally and we want to reinvent the way supermarkets do business in the future.”
To find out more or to off time, skills or money, email ruth.anslow@hisbe.co.uk.
Why can’t they fund the additional £20k from the profits from the York Place operation?
Well their strap line is ‘happiness before profit’ – I’m guessing they’re not about making lots of profit
There is a whole food shop already in the area which will be affected it’s just another wannabe supermarkets bullying its way in so it’s not happiness before profit its profit profit before happiness
No there isn’t. The other whole food shop closed down a few months ago.
As a local resident, I’m very happy to see them opening in Kemptown. Will certainly make a nice change from Morrisons.
Exactly my point
So, no Hove store after all?
It’s a shame the Hove store never got off the ground. Very concerned for HISBE now, can’t see it reopening which is sad, it appears the money has run out.