CAPTIONS

Manager Roz Tarman and husband Melvin, Assistant Manager, at Colchester Scout and Guide Shop

Another satisfied customer

Colchester Scout and Guide Shop operates out of these two portacabins

ARTICLE

The Colchester Scout and Guide Shop is a small voluntary not-for-profit enterprise which is open only four-and-a-half hours a week – but such is its commercial expertise it has just been given a “centre of excellence” designation by The Scout Association which has overall responsibility for Scouting activities throughout the United Kingdom.

This huge vote of confidence is testimony to all the hard work which the 13 volunteers devote each Friday evening and Saturday morning, under the leadership of Manager Roz Tarman supported as Assistant Manager by her husband Melvin. For them, and many of the volunteers, running the shop is in addition to the hours they put in as uniformed leaders during the rest of the week – in the case of Mrs Tarman she runs the 2nd Tey Rainbows and 1st Marks Tey Brownies, with Mr Tarman leading 1st Great Tey Cubs and Scouts.

Colchester has two Scout Districts, and it is the “North” district which partners local Girlguiding UK in operating the shop which is in two redundant portacabins next to 1st Stanway Scouts headquarters in Villa Road. The first was installed in 2007, the second in 2012.

The enterprise started when Mr and Mrs Tarman began a local thriftshop for passing on uniforms which youngsters had outgrown, and then 12 years ago they began issuing badges and new uniforms out of plastic boxes at the now demolished 1st Eight Ash Green Scout Hut. Such was the success, with increasing numbers of Scout and Guide groups wanting to take advantage of a local shop for uniforms, badges and associated equipment, that two years later they moved to a corner of the site where 1st Stanway Scouts HQ is based.

Further growth led to the need to double the size of the shop with a second portacabin.

Such is the shop’s appeal it has 400 participating Scout and Guide groups and sections registered from North and Mid Essex and into Suffolk.

There are 39,000 separate items of stock available, ranging from uniforms for members of both the Scout and Guide Movements to proficiency badges which youngsters gain for passing tests showing knowledge of specific subjects.

The shop operates on business lines, geared to cover all operating costs and make a surplus – the big advantage to Scout and Guide groups being that the surplus is shared as a dividend refund, depending on the value of purchases, to assist each individual group to pay for further purchases of badges and equipment.

When I became a Wolf Cub in 1956 the franchise for a Scout and Guide Shop in Colchester was at Markhams in Priory Street, whose owner Mr Hugh Markham was a leading Scouter. In due course this ended, and in subsequent years the sale of uniforms and issuing of badges was undertaken by varying methods, by commercial shops in terms of uniforms and volunteer badge secretaries for the latter.

It was not ideal, so the establishment of the volunteer-run Colchester Scout and Guide Shop was greatly welcomed. The steady growth has reached the point where it is bursting at the seams…….with further expansion being contemplated.