About Us

We are a not-for-profit community benefit society.

Our Vision

Is for everyone in our community to ‘Be A Piece Of The Puzzle’ and to support its sustainable success as an independent pub empowering local people.

We want the Puzzle Hall Inn in people’s minds and hearts. Offering social support and creative space in Sowerby Bridge for generations to come.

Our Mission

Our mission is to collaborate as a community, sustainably supporting local people, suppliers and independent businesses. We provide a safe space that accepts, welcomes and empowers everyone, and tackles isolation and loneliness in the community. As a Community Benefit Society, we reinvest in the Puzzle Hall to improve its facilities and services, into community development initiatives in partnership with other local community organisations.

Puzzle Hall Community Pub Limited

Registered office: 21 Hollins Mill Lane, Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire, HX6 2RF

Registered by the FCA as a Community Benefit Society under the Co-operative and Community Benefit Societies Act 2014. Registration Number: 7568. Registration date: 2 June 2017

CRN: RS007568

Proud members of:
Co-operatives UK
Plunkett Foundation

Values

  • Co-operative Community: We work with and support each other and other local independent businesses: buying from local suppliers, collaborating with other local pubs, and promoting local and regional musicians, artists and performers.
  • Inclusive: We provide a safe community space that accepts, welcomes and empowers everyone, taking care to provide for the social needs of all, without gender, social, racial, political or religious discrimination.
  • Creative: The Puzzle spirit is creative, fun and eccentric. It’s a space to be whoever you want to be, find your creativity and support the creativity of others
  • Democratic: All members are equal; voting power can’t be bought – one member, one vote. We are accountable to each other and ourselves and maintain a culture of openness, honesty, and respect.
  • Sustainable: We will take care of our community and our resources and ensure that our actions and decisions are sustainable to enable long-term success and stability.

Objectives

  • To enable everyone in the community to ‘Be A Piece of The Puzzle’ by investing in shares, donating, volunteering or using the space.
  • To maintain the building long term, with a program of reinvestment and development
  • To provide a safe, supportive, inclusive, accessible environment for all members of the community including older people, teenagers, minority groups and isolated individuals.
  • To provide an events program supporting and promoting live music, especially from local bands and musicians.
  • To provide an attractive, flexible, multi-purpose, sustainable facility that enables participation in social, cultural and leisure activities.
  • To enable a diverse range of community support focussed on music and creative arts.
  • To be profitable enough to service any costs and debts, reinvest in the building, develop new community services, and in the long term enable share withdrawal.
  • To support other community projects that meet the values of the Puzzle Hall Community Pub Limited

Legal Structure

Puzzle Hall Community Pub Limited

Registered by the FCA as a Community Benefit Society under the Co-operative and Community Benefit Societies Act 2014. Registration number: 7568, Registration date: 2 June 2017. The registered address is: 21 Hollins Mill Lane, Sowerby Bridge, HX6 2RF

Company Registration Number: RS007568

The benefits of this legal structure are:

  • The local community will own the building in perpetuity.
  • People feel more committed to the facilities offered by the pub.
  • Being a Community Benefit Society allows us to attract grant support
  • All members have an equal vote, regardless of the size of their shareholding.
  • Directors (and shareholders) have the protection of ‘limited liability’.

This structure is particularly appropriate because:

  • It is democratic and accountable to the community members who elect the board of directors.
  • It is allowed to advertise shares for sale to the community and pay interest on those shares.
  • It has an asset lock, which ensures that the Puzzle Hall Inn and its assets can only ever be used for community benefit rather than private profit.

The stated objects of the Society are:

  • To carry on any business for the benefit of the community by working with other public, private and voluntary bodies to preserve the Puzzle Hall Inn (21 Hollins Lane, Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire, HX6 2RF) as a community asset.
  • To promote the conservation, protection and improvement of the Puzzle Hall Inn and it’s surrounding environment for the benefit of the local community.
  • To develop initiatives aimed at making the Puzzle Hall inn an accessible inclusive, sustainable and creative heritage venue for those who live in work in or visit Sowerby Bridge and surrounding area.

The Puzzle is different to many of the pubs, as it :

  • Depends for its survival on community musicians, promoters, artists and performers who contribute enormously to the live events and the general ambience of the Puzzle.
  • It is essential to future engagement of the community and shareholders that a share of any profit generated is reinvested in the building, the community and returned to shareholders as interest.