9th March 2026 6.30pm
Ratify minutes from last meeting.
All agreed
Update on enforcement notice
We had feedback from our local councillor at NDDC that their view is that the pub is a pub and that it is not a residence and they are aware that there are personal items stored there but this is temporary. The owners are allowed to stay there while work is being carried out – the council position is that they are not allowed to live in the premises.
The owners may come back to the property and they are perfectly entitled to do that while they are carrying out any works and it is not our position as the CBS to become involved in this.
Next steps- wait for the owners return and see if there is any news from them regarding what their plans are.
Website progress
IW is creating new website using Elementor – but there are some issues with this – hoping PG might be able to help with the issues.
PG has had experience of using this software and it has caused issues for him in the past and he has agreed to help.
Despite the issues, which involve missing data the website building is going well and we do have a new website with 3 pages.
Action:
PG to meet with IW and see if he can resolve the data issues.
Social media content– we need to post more now. Feeding into our social media may help us raise the money that we need in the future. We need to generate the interest so that more people will want to get involved – if we do this now it will help us be prepared.
Action:
Members of the committee to send photographs or ideas for posts to HA. Share content from the shop on our pages- keep people updated on what is going on with the pub (if we know)– post about the new website and publicise link
Fundraising-when we start that we need to get others on board to help with the fundraising. We need to utilise the skillset in the village. Are there other people who could help with this and if so who? It would be beneficial to us to divvy up the jobs – difficult to start this at the moment as nothing has started but we need to think about who we could get involved.
Also there are people who do not believe that what we are doing is possible so we really need to perform some public relations exercises so that when something happens more people will want to get involved.
We need to make sure that more people understand the importance of this possible project for the community as a whole.
It is a lot of money to raise we are ahead of the game because we have set up the CBS and the bank accounts but six months is not a long time and we need to be better prepared to get going should the pub be put on the market.
Can we get a local celeb involved – thinking about the Yorkshire Pub supported by Jon Richardson- what celebs are local to us- Caroline Quentin, Kirsty Allsop, Carol Klein, Jo Brand- may all be local who else and how do we approach people like this to see if they want to gt involved?
Whether we should start having stalls at local events such as the one at Witheridge on 25th April was discussed but it was decided that this I too soon as really there is very little to say currently. If things change and there is an opportunity for us to buy the pub we need to attend many local markets and events to drum up support.
There will be an advert going into the Academic Archers conference material.
Action:
Utilizing our social media to the max.
HA to publicise links to our Facebook and Instagram pages on other local sites in Tiverton, South Molton and Witheridge.
4th July village day we will have a stall again – up date people and make a larger display. Materials stored at HA’s house will need to be updated. HA also has a display frame that can be utilized for a banner or backdrop or to display the banner that we had made last time. PG and AG are able to supply the empty barrel once again.
We could have a crafting activity, something for people to do and this might make then stay longer and interact with us more- design your own cocktail or similar that could be served in the pub when it opens.
NM and AW to come up with some ideas for this.
AOB
Banking –NH suggested that the money we have in the CBS account should be transferred into a savings account. It was agreed that this would be a good idea as long as the money was easily accessible.
Action:
NH to open a savings account and transfer the money
Next meeting for the village day planning 6.30 pm at NH -NM in reserve if unable to Wednesday 3rd June.