Multiply’s Magic- Navigating Numbers With Coterminous

A couple of weeks ago the Impact team paid a visit to York Travellers Trust. Light, bright and welcoming, the Trust is a cohesive community space for Gypsy and Traveller Communities, which doubles up as a foodbank, education centre, community-hub, and refuge for meaningful conversations.

Coterminous, one of our fantastic partners on the Multiply project, have been running a series of ‘Shopping on a Budget’ sessions at the Trust, and invited us along to have a chat and see the support taking place on the ground.

Hosted by Coterminous’s Project Manager & Employability Coach, CJ Allison, and close friend (and budgeting extraordinaire), Harrie Smith, the primary focus of the sessions has been budgeting, bargain hunting, and reducing food waste. All skills we could use a hand with in an inflated economic landscape:

Chatting amongst the group, it’s clear the course has been impactful, numerically and socially- ‘’it’s a really lovely group’’.  For the participants who live alone, the sessions have offered a space to connect and share tips and tricks, from how to preserve your food, to supermarket ‘cheat codes’; cheapest items are on the lower shelves, visiting between 6-8pm is most likely to score you some discounts.

For other members of the group, sessions have been about exploration; trying new recipes, veering into batch-cooking, and discussing how to cater to a large family on a budget (which for one participant, means feeding four children who all like different things).

The sessions have also invited participants to get creative when it comes to numbers- how and where can they save money? There are loads of interesting suggestions, but Harrie tells us about a range of apps he’s spent years trialling and has introduced to the group, from Too Good To Go (discounted food) and Trolley (supermarket price comparisons), to WeAre8 (where you can watch videos & earn money back). Some genuinely useful resources when you need to be intentional about every purchase.

Come the end of the session, it’s time to consolidate what the group have learnt over the past five weeks and reflect upon what the course has meant to them. Across their responses (‘’meeting people’’, ‘’sharing knowledge’’, ‘’openness’’, ‘’togetherness’’, ‘’nutrition’’, ‘’money saving’’, ‘’new recipes’’) it’s clear that for our participants, Multiply has meant confidence. It has allowed them to recalibrate their expenses, learn financial flexibility, and navigate numbers through a newfound lens.

A huge thank you to CJ and Harrie for allowing us to sit in on their last session!

Want to learn more about the Multiply programme? Visit our page here, or contact Christine Brass / cbrass@betterconnect.org.uk. Why not keep an eye out for our upcoming video case-studies too.