Happiness isn’t just about feeling good in and for yourself, it’s when you know happiness in others is because of something you’ve done. That was the jist of a sermon I heard last week, and although it’s not a new thought, it chimes with the mood of the times.

Witness the rise of the not-for-profit social enterprise, the co-operative and the crowd-funded food venture: supporting others certainly feels like the zeitgeist du jour. Threats of tax credit cuts, the mushrooming of food banks and the mass migration of displaced and desperate people have only fuelled the sense of injustice in the distribution of wealth. Now there’s a new food venture in Glasgow that relies not only crowd-funding but also on something called loan-funding, and if it comes to fruition will be the first of its type in Scotland.

Glasgow Locavore is one such not-for-profit social enterprise and since 2012 it’s been working towards its goal of creating a fairer, more sustainable food system with a shop selling locally grown organic vegetables, eggs, cheeses and meat, plus ethically-sourced loose grains and pulses; and an organic vegetable delivery box scheme from its own market garden in Neilston which is now reaching 200 people across West Central Scotland each week.

At The Croft, a growing site at Queen’s Park Recreation Ground on the city’s south side, they also run “nano-market gardens”, 50sq m plots for market gardeners along with guidance on growing food at a scale that meets the needs of the shop and the veg box scheme, and giving a guaranteed market and fair price for everything they grow. It’s all aimed at breaking the cycle where 97% of the UK’s grocery spend goes to big business.

Earlier this week [Monday 9] they took delivery of The Duchess, a Saddleback pig and her six piglets from Ballencrieff Farm in Haddington, East Lothian, to be cared for at the plot in Neilston. Pre-orders for the pork have already been taken (last year, when the piglets were raised in Queen’s Park, there was a public outcry when they went to the slaughterhouse).

Staff are paid the living wage and suppliers are offered a fair price for their produce. Locavore hosts a Good Food Fund which uses cash donations to give food from the shop, at its cost price, to those in desperate need via The Space charity. Recipients (who tend to be mostly Romanian and Slovakian) can, if able, give £1 for their food, which is of much higher nutritional value than much the stuff distributed by most food banks – which rely on donations from supermarket customers. Some supermarkets actually market cheap food as being “ideal for food banks” and ask their customers to pay for it, thus profiteering from poverty.

Reuben Chesters, Locavore Glasgow’s founder, sees food as a vehicle for social change. Unlike the supermarkets he has no shareholders seeking profits; he and his staff are motivated by the idea that they can benefit society and the environment by kickstarting local food economies.

Now they have taken another big step up. Last week Locavore launched its Big Plan: crowd-funding (and crowd-loaning) enough money to launch a social enterprise supermarket in Glasgow that, at 1000sq m would be roughly the size of a standard Lidl shop, and 20 times the size of its current shop on Nithsdale Road. If realised, the store and its funding would be unique in Scotland.

The target is £200,000 by April, and within just three days of launching they had been pledged £22,000. They have also attracted £17,500 from First Port’s social enterprise accelerator programme, which they’ve been using to develop ideas. Through Launch Me, they have been receiving business guidance and the opportunity to meet with private investors and social lenders. This programme will also match-fund up to £100,000. Chesters is keen to raise as much as possible by March next year so he can present it for match-funding in April and thus move ahead with the supermarket; the funding campaign will be ongoing until the target is reached.

Supporters are being invited to pledge up to £250 to the crowd-funding campaign, between £250-£5000 through loan funding (where they lend money and choose a rate of return between 0% and 6% – better than the rate currently being offered on savings accounts by any high street bank). Donations of more than £5000 could benefit from Social Investment Tax Relief.

This is far from pie in the sky. Chesters has been doing his homework. He and his team have visited similar retail models of comparative scale around the world, and they have spent a week at the UK’s largest co-operative retailer, the Unicorn Grocery in Manchester, where they were given access to set-up costs and systems to finance and IT. Although Unicorn is vegan and does not sell meat or dairy, it’s very successful. Locavore’s supermarket will sell these items and more, and Chesters is confident of its potential for success.

He is justifiably excited by the support he’s enjoying for his new project. Perhaps he’s already experiencing the glow of enabling others to spread a little happiness.

Visit www.glasgowlocavore.org/BigPlan

@catedvinewriter