SYCM Celebrate Co-operatives Fortnight with a Lesson in Style

25th June 2012

Co-operatives Fortnight 2012 is the co-operative sector’s national campaign, bringing together co-operatives up and down the country to highlight how co-operatives share their profits, give people an equal say and help build a better world.  It is a peak of activity in the International Year of Co-operatives.  It runs from 23 June to 7 July with an aim of showing how co-operatives help in building a better world.

  
Central to the philosophy of Country Markets is the sharing of skills.  Whilst this is generally seen in the products our members make and craft at home there is also a need to look at how other skills can be shared and learnt from to benefit the Markets we run.  In South Yorkshire we identified that all Markets could benefit from looking at presentation and display of our products.  Upwards of 30 producers attended a day long session in Penistone on Monday 25 June to learn how their skills could be improved through co-operative effort and shared learning.

The participants were helped by an injection of professional knowledge and expertise from Kate Measures who specialises in helping her clients to create inspiring learning and interpretation experiences in heritage environments in her day job, but she has also been the Market Advisor to North Yorkshire Country Markets.

The Producers had a stimulating and enjoyable day which stimulated their learning and ideas through a series of activities including teams doing the 'Dazzling Displays Team Challenge', i.e. a themed display against the clock, which was a lot of fun