The Usual Place is an award-winning organisation, World Host Destination and a Disability Confident Leader. The Usual Place opened its doors as a community cafe in 2015 and is the brainchild of CEO Heather Hall.

Inspired Community Enterprise Trust LTD (ICET) was set up in November 2011 with the aim of responding to the voice of young disabled people who shared their concerns and fears about the lack of employment, Further Education and community-based opportunities available to young people with additional support needs. They created an innovative partnership with Dumfries and Galloway College and developed an accessible approach to delivering an externally accredited SVQ Qualification in Hospitality. Young people successfully piloted this qualification leading developments.

They now deliver 4 accessible SVQ’s and a range of other qualifications including Food Safety and First Aid.

Many of the young people who have thrived through their programmes would previously have been invisible, excluded, at risk of isolation and loneliness and importantly, unable to fulfil their potential as valuable, active citizens contributing positively to their communities.
ICET focuses on promoting the innate talents and capabilities of young people, enabling and empowering them to flourish, and challenging the established stereotype of young people with learning disabilities.

They are based in a famous historic building in the heart of Dumfries.
All the money they make in the café, and from room and event rental is used to cover business costs in support of their aims. It is important to point out that ICET is not self-funding and relies on external grant-funding.
Last year the Charity had income of £741,800 and expenditure of £691,435.

The are on a journey as far as their digital maturity is concerned and would benefit from the experience of a digital trustee to help them raise their profile through both the website and social media channels. Like a lot of organisations they have a lot of fabulous self-generated content but lack the time and skill set to properly use it.

They have a strategic plan which is very focussed on fund-raising and rightly takes up management time. An identified gap is a robust social media /profile raising strategy to support their efforts.