Door 84

From their base in a historically under-resourced area of York, Door 84 creates a safe, welcoming place where all members of the community can connect, learn and thrive.

"Our role is to try to provide support for our community, to be able to engage in activities that lead to developmental opportunities for our young people, opportunities for the older members of our community to have a social space, to reduce isolation and loneliness – and to have access to food. York is traditionally perceived as a very affluent city, but there are pockets of deprivation.  There’s economic inactivity here, social isolation and food insecurity.  That’s why we exist."

Financial Model and Mission Integrity

As with many social enterprises, the balance between purpose and sustainability is delicate. "Ninety percent of our income is fundraised. We have to apply to foundations and for grants to support our existence.  We own our building and rent out our space when we can, but the maintenance and upkeep can be a big drain on resources.  I’d describe our business as asset rich and cash poor. The difficulty is how to use our building in a way that keeps our charity in line with our values and our mission.”

Modernising our processes has been a big challenge

The governance of Door 84’s structure changed when it became a CIO (Charitable Incorporated Organisation) in 2023.  Still heavily reliant on paper, they needed to digitise, which meant introducing software and streamlining processes.

“There's a huge amount of change management involved in bringing the team along, but we’re starting to reap the benefits - and it’s freed up more hours for face-to-face delivery with our community.”

Measuring What Matters

Success at Door 84 isn’t measured in profit margins but by presence. "We track attendance numbers, feedback from our sessions and community engagement. We use Upshot to help with registration and evaluations.  We listen to what our community says they want – and then adapt accordingly.”

One area that has changed significantly is youth sessions. 

"Post-pandemic, we were experiencing behaviour that really challenged us. So we moved from open-access evenings to more structured activities. However, we’ve seen that those who want to attend and engage come along and those who perhaps need more support with their behavioural choices, have stopped coming.  We're not too happy about that because we still want to be able to support those young people, but it's about finding the right balance.  Our ideal would be to have more youth workers supporting the sessions, but the barrier to that is funding.”

Social Impact Beyond Profit

"Charities have to be commercial now.  We look at our sustainability in the same way a business would.  The real difficulty when you're operating project-to-project is not being able to plan long-term.

In terms of environmental impact, we are aware of our carbon footprint and try to run our building as efficiently as possible.  We’ve applied and secured funding to improve our energy efficiency.  We’ve got solar panels, new windows and doors and a heat pump. We’re saving food from landfill and redistributing it to our community.  And we’re encouraging people to walk to our centre.  Part of sustaining the charity is being aware of all funding opportunities as well as encouraging our local community to think about their own impact on the environment.”

Reputation and Relationships

"People often think our building is just there to be used, but we have to remind them that we’re still a charity, needing to cover our costs.

"We partner with other organisations where there’s synergy.  We collaborate and run joint projects with organisations that also work with young people.  When we run our community cafe, the ward councillors come and have a table so that they can meet the community.  The local area coordinator will have a space so that she can connect with local residents - and other charities, like the hygiene bank, use our space to distribute their products.”

The Real Value of Collaboration

“The important thing about partnerships is finding meaningful ones where there is a mutual benefit to both organisations.  Are we better as a collaboration? Because sometimes it's not always the case.  It comes back to how funding is apportioned.  Sometimes, large organisations involve smaller ones to lend weight to a funding bid but it’s not always equitable.  So having that real clear, transparent relationship around what is involved in a partnership and the expectations is really important.”

The Value of Social Enterprise in the Wider Economy

“It's often said if you stopped social enterprise, the gaps in society would be so severe and have a huge negative knock-on impact on economies and on communities.  I would always say there's a lot of unseen work that happens with social enterprises.  On the one hand, the value of that can be quantified by saying it took a member of staff an hour to do such and such and that’s their hourly rate.  But the true value is how that extends into the lives of the person that has been supported and their family, their neighbours and the community in which they live.  That's the true value of social enterprise.“

The Future

There’s a vision to build a community kitchen. 

"We’ve got the space, the plans, the appetite. We just need the funding. We would run workshops on food skills, budgeting, nutrition - and provide access to food, created by the community for the community.  It would be a brilliant asset to the city.

"We’d love to partner with a business to help us bring it to life.  Not just volunteers for a day, but real support.  The expertise, the funding, the skill-sharing."

Advice for Others

"Have a clear vision but be realistic about the costs.  Project-to-project funding makes long-term planning difficult, so I would encourage anybody who's considering setting up a social enterprise to have a real clear idea of funding for the first five years at least."

How businesses can best support social enterprises

“Social enterprises are already really stretched, often doing three or four different roles within the organisation.  What we really need is the expertise of business, the marketeers, analysts, accountants and computing experts.  Sending your team out to do manual labour to fulfil their volunteering days isn't necessarily useful for social enterprises.  Instead, we need them to do their day job for us.

“Also, consider your future talent pipeline.  A lot of the work we do is about raising awareness, finding opportunities and raising the aspirations of our young people.  How can we introduce you to them?  If we could do our work alongside the businesses in York, it would be all the better for the community.”