One of our clients, Ashdown Phillips, has been nominated for an award for their support in the community during the pandemic, and everyone here at IPM is thrilled for them.
COVID-19 hit Edmonton Green especially hard. The locality is one of the most deprived areas in Greater London. The Ashdown Phillips team considered it their prime duty to proactively support their wider community, including 2,000 residents living at the heart of the scheme, many of whom are elderly and live in assisted accommodation.
To proactively provide support in terms of care packages and donations to the local community of Edmonton/Enfield Borough, whilst also running a 26-acre shopping centre with 30 essential retailers still open and a management team reduced by 50% due to furlough and a vacant position.
The Ashdown Phillips team reached out to over 20 different community groups, including the NHS and key workers, to make donations not only to those in need, but also to those organisations helping those in need. They purchased items from retailers who were open on site to contribute to the community and made 2 deliveries a week, including one to Enfield Stands Together, which was delivering care packages to the many vulnerable residents. The response was amazing and the groups to whom the team donated were genuinely grateful.
In their role of managing a community scheme, the Ashdown Phillips team strive every day to both operate an efficiently functioning shopping centre and to ensure they make a positive impact on the community in everything they do. They have received brilliant feedback on how the community has been helped through the donations they have made and most importantly, they have not only cemented existing relationships in the local community but also built new ones.
One example is Edmonton Baptist Church. At no charge, the team placed parking bollards in the car park and provided increased lighting outside for when parishioners attend during the evening. They also continue to give donations to the Church’s Homeless project, everything from toilet rolls to bottled water!
The team have worked tirelessly through the pandemic, and with a reduced headcount, to keep the shopping centre running as well as enhancing their focus on community related activities. On a daily basis, the team stepped out of their comfort zone into an unknown ‘new normal’ and made the community initiatives their priority. They instinctively knew that “The Green” needed their support and through their efforts reinforced the collective will to stand together during the crisis.
The team say that working in FM often throws up the unexpected and that was certainly the case with COVID-19. They knew that they alone couldn’t fix everything, but by working together they certainly put smiles on faces, including their own, sprinkled some magic into people’s daily lives and demonstrated how their goal always has and continues to be placing Edmonton Green Shopping Centre at the very heart of the community.