Within the month of December, many of us reflect on the past year’s achievements and start to look ahead to the coming year. As I look back and consider the individual and collective achievements here at Emmaus Mossley, there’s much to celebrate and be proud about from 2025.
Community success
Emmaus Mossley’s community has provided a home, safety, support and opportunities to 33 people in 2025. Our support staff have not only helped people develop and achieve their goals, they’ve also assisted people through difficult moments and life challenges too.
Working together, we’ve helped people build confidence, improve their health and wellbeing, gain new experiences, access training, secure jobs and move on into their own homes. In fact, our companions have completed more than 110 training courses this year, including accredited courses, in-person teaching, online training, ESOL courses and GCSEs. As always, I’m immensely proud of everyone who achieves their aspirations – very well done to all who have taken positive steps forward this year!
Alongside the day to day of supporting people at our community, a focus of 2025 has been on improving the communal rooms and individual bedrooms used by our residents. We created a new, larger and more functional companion kitchen and improved the shared dining room and lounge area. We also started overhauling and refurbishing all 26 bedrooms too, a project that will continue over the coming year.
Solidarity action
Early on in 2025, we shut our Superstore for the day to allow our whole team to volunteer in solidarity with five groups. We supported Friends of Mossley Park, Mossley Community Centre, Mossley Town Team, Emmaus North Staffs and Emmaus South Manchester.
It was great to bring our companions, volunteers, staff and trustees together to make a positive impact in support of others. But this was just one of many acts of solidarity we have completed throughout the year. Thanks to kind visitors to Emmaus, our Pay It Forward scheme in support of Mossley Food Bank has raised more than £1,000 in 2025, paying for food and essentials for local people and families in need.
In August we held our annual Solidarity Sale, raising £3,340 for the Emmaus International movement. In September, a team of companions and staff hiked up Snowdon, raising more than £800 for Oldham Mountain Rescue Team. We also held our annual Macmillan Coffee Morning that month which raised £991 for the cancer charity.
Sharing acts of kindness has many benefits and I’m very proud and grateful to everyone who has contributed to and supported Emmaus Mossley’s solidarity action this year.
Social enterprise and events
Our Secondhand Superstore remains a vibrant hub for the people of Mossley and beyond. In 2025, we have carried out further improvements to expand and evolve our retail space and the processing of donated goods. Work is ongoing and we’re excited to share with you something new in early 2026 – watch this space!
As well as providing a welcoming space for people to shop more sustainably whilst supporting our charity, an important element of our Superstore and café is bringing people together to combat loneliness and social isolation. To help with this goal, this year we launched The Social Studio, a monthly social evening revolving around a different hands-on activity each month.
In total, Emmaus Mossley has hosted over 25 community events in 2025. These included our Cabaret, Spring Fayre, Teddy Bear’s Picnic, Thread Revolution and Christmas Celebration, but also events run by partners including Mossley SOUP, Be Well Tameside, Tameside Community Safety Team and Mossley Town Team. I do love the atmosphere when people get together at Emmaus, especially when former companions return to enjoy our events with their friends and family members.
Our future plans
As some of you may already be aware, next year I will be passing the Emmaus Mossley CEO baton to someone new. I will be leaving Emmaus and taking a long overdue gap year! Serving Emmaus Mossley as CEO since 2012 has been a real privilege and an honour. As we look ahead to the future, I’m sure it will prove to be the same for my successor.
My decision and the orderly transition to a new CEO is part of a wider succession planning process, fully supported by the Emmaus Mossley Board of Trustees. For anyone interested in applying for the CEO role, please visit the Peridot website for more information.
Next year promises to be an exciting one, not just for Emmaus Mossley, but also for the wider Emmaus movement in the UK. As always, our focus remains on supporting people who experience homelessness and poverty. Collectively and individually, Emmaus communities are working hard to improve the package of support we give to all of our companions. This includes building in more flexibility to help people with different support needs and life goals.
2025 has been a year of progress on many fronts and as always, I’m very grateful to everyone involved in our charity for their continued efforts and commitment. To all the people and partners who support Emmaus Mossley, sincere thanks for helping us achieve what we do. Your support is making a real difference here at our community, empowering people to move on from homelessness for good.