A guide to third sector trading - WCVA

It’s an idea, but is it business? A guide to third sector trading
1: Getting
started
2: First steps 3: Business
planning
4: Legal and
governance
5: Funding
and
resourcing
6: Financial
controls
7: Managing
growth
8: Management
and
governance
9: Social
enterprise
10: Sources
of support
Get some basic information:
• Find out more about third sector trading.
− Download material from appropriate web sites; share it with
your group.
− Visit two or three projects in your area – seeing what others
do can inspire you with (completely different) ideas about
what you could do.
− Join networks and speak to umbrella organisations about what
you want to do. Their web sites can be mines of information,
and there is no substitute for talking to people who have
already done what you are planning.
− Some information you receive may be contradictory.
Challenge confusing advice and get a second or third opinion.
• Study this guide
• Discuss the idea informally with colleagues and like-minded
people. Get a sense of:
− what you want to achieve and how trading can help to do it
− what resources you will need just to start planning – a
meeting place, means to communicate, resources for visits
− what skills you will need in your group
− who might try to stop you or dissuade you, whether they have
a point, why you should go ahead, how you can avoid being
knocked off course
− what outside bodies or individuals might help.
• Be clear where you are starting from. It might sound obvious
but there are huge differences, depending on whether:
− you are working with an existing voluntary organisation which
simply wants to start trading (and faces no obstacles to doing
so), or
− you are working with an existing organisation which aims to
set up a new organisation to undertake trading activities, or
− you are starting completely from scratch.
• Make a plan of the next steps you need to take.
− who else you can rely on to support what you will do
− who else you must involve from the start
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