The Watch Café 2 is a community interest company run by Oak Field School (a community special school) with Nottingham City Council Community Protection. They help local people with learning disabilities by providing support and training towards employment.
The organisation expanded their community cafe into the city by creating Cafe 2 on the 2nd floor of Nottingham City Centre’s Central Police Station. The new cafe aims to bridge the gap in opportunities for students when they leave Oak Field School, providing opportunities for:
- Barista training
- Cooking and Food Hygiene Training
- Improving customer-facing skills
- Getting help moving into supported or open employment
Staffed and operated by former Oak Field School students, Café 2 is a works-café, serving employees and visitors of the city centre police station.
G F Tomlinson delivered the alterations and reconfiguration of the existing café area to enable it to be staffed and operated by the new employees. Works included:
- Removal, relocation and alterations to serving worktops
- Replacement ceiling tiles
- Painting and decoration
- Upgrade of M&E services, including commissioning and testing
- Building Control sign-off
Funding – Oak Field School had secured £10,000 funding, enough to cover set-up costs for insurance, legal fees, IT, equipment, stock and contingency only.
G F Tomlinson provided expertise, labour and materials free of charge to support Oak Field School achieve their goal. This included:
- Design work to ensure the catering equipment, required to run the café, would fit in the space available. Our in-house Design Manager produced plans and 3D visuals to ensure the end users could better understand the proposed layout of the final result.
- Directly employed labour and materials to deliver the refurbishment works and redecoration
- Specialist input from our supply chain partner, Nottingham-based ABSN, who provided their expertise and labour free of charge to undertake alterations and commissioning of the mechanical and electrical services in the building to suit the new layout of the café.
Live Environment – Central Police Station remained open and fully operational, with adjacent floors occupied throughout. All works were carefully planned around the requirements of the building users (Nottinghamshire Police and Nottingham City Council Community Protection) to ensure access was maintained and disruption minimised.
Experienced and trained resources were deployed and all appropriate H&S measures adopted, protecting the safety of users and operatives.
OUTCOMES
- 87 G F Tomlinson staff volunteer hours
- 20 supply chain volunteer hours
- 2 work experience placements during refurbishment works
- 8 young people trained since opening
- 100% social value added
Reduced Financial Pressures – With refurbishment works carried out free of charge, Oak Field School were able to prioritise their secured funding for business set up costs without delays to the project as a result of further funding applications and procurement.
Completion on Time – Enabling Oak Field School to commence installation of catering equipment to ensure the opening date was not compromised.
Open on time – The Watch | Café 2 opened as planned on 4th February 2020, creating a safe working and training environment for adults with learning disabilities and promote social inclusion. Since opening the café has provided training for 8 young people, despite the 5 month closure imposed during the Covid-19 national lockdown.
Tony Beck, The Watch | Café 2 Director and Oak Field School Governor, commented: “All the Governors and school staff are greatly appreciative of G F Tomlinson’s offer to refurbish Cafe Two at Byron house free of charge. We recognise the project would have struggled to start up without their help. Thanks to G F Tomlinson’s support to reconfigure the Byron House café, The Watch | Café 2 opened for business this week. Thank you for your support.”
