As 2025, our tenth year, draws to a close, it is a pleasure to wish you a Merry Christmas from everyone here at The Usual Place. At the beginning of this year I was genuinely unsure whether we would reach this point at all.

The past twelve months have been among the most challenging in our history.  Significant increases in staffing costs, rising living and operating expenses, and an exceptionally difficult funding landscape meant that doing nothing was not an option.  Without decisive action, closure would have been inevitable.

Our Board of Trustees made the painfully difficult decision to restructure the organisation, refocusing firmly on our core purpose: creating life-changing opportunities for young people with additional support needs.  This decision was guided by our values – that everyone is of equal worth, everyone can contribute to their community, and everyone deserves dignity and respect.

That restructure came at a very real human cost.  Twelve valued colleagues left The Usual Place, each having contributed skill, care and commitment to our work and to the young people we enable.  We remain extremely grateful to them and hold them with respect. These decisions were taken with honesty, compassion and responsibility.

The team who continues on this journey is smaller, but also deeply experienced and committed.  They work alongside young people with positive expectations, respect and belief, creating environments where young people can develop skills, confidence and independence at their own pace.

While our ultimate goal is to enable young people with additional support needs to achieve meaningful employment, we value every step that leads there and every part of the network of employers across the region who are committed to creating inclusive workplaces.  Transformation shows itself in many ways: growing confidence, independence, communication, contribution and active citizenship. These developments are not side outcomes – they are central to building sustainable futures for individuals who want a life, not a service.

To offer these opportunities with integrity, we must be certain of our own future.  Young people deserve consistency and follow-through, and our responsibility is to ensure we can make and keep commitments.  The difficult decisions we have taken this year were about safeguarding that trust and ensuring we can both live our values at every level of the organisation and provide bespoke enablement for individuals – rather than churning young people through a system or tick-box exercises.

Overwhelming Support

Throughout this year, support for The Usual Place has been overwhelming and has come from many directions.  Individuals, community groups, local businesses, cafe customers, volunteers and partners across the region and beyond have stood with us in practical, generous and creative ways.  From individual donations, fundraising events and personal challenges to regular custom, advocacy and encouragement, this collective effort has been extraordinary.

We are so grateful to the many people who have donated so generously to The Usual Place during this year – your contributions have made a real difference.  Also to Dumfries & Galloway Council, the Scottish Government and South of Scotland Enterprise for providing vital breathing space, and we are indebted to our long-standing funders, including The Holywood Trust and The National Lottery Community Fund, whose belief in our work has remained steadfast.  We have also been encouraged by renewed confidence from trusts and foundations who are recognising the care and responsibility with which we are shaping our future.

Friends of The Usual Place

While grant funding will always play a role, we are working towards greater long-term resilience.  That is why we are launching Friends of The Usual Place  – a circle of people who choose to support our work regularly and sustainably.  Many people have already given the gift of Friendship by becoming part of this circle and already it is starting to grow!

Our Friends and donors are partners in young people’s futures.  By investing early and consistently, they help create the conditions in which young people with additional support needs can grow, make choices and shape their own paths – enabled, respected, valued and ready to start investing in themselves.

“Friends of The Usual Place come in all shapes and sizes.  You can give whatever feels right for you.  What matters is being part of a growing circle of encouragement that supports our work with young people.  Every Friendship adds up, and together they really do change lives”

Alongside this, we are developing philanthropic opportunities for individual and corporate giving, helping us build long-term endurance and, in time, an endowment fund to safeguard our work for future generations.

Why invest in The Usual Place?

Because while our numbers may be small, our impact is significant.  Independent analysis shows that for every £1 invested, society saves at least £11 – value generated through opportunity, participation and belief in people.  So far, it has been calculated that The Usual Place has contributed over £9.8M value to our local economy.

One of the highlights of 2025 was our Fine Dining Afternoon Fundraiser – the culmination of an extraordinary partnership with the team at The Globe Inn.  This collaboration brought together young people, local businesses and the wider community, raising almost £10,000 and providing rich, real-world experience and training that will stay with the young participants long into the future.

This work has never been about headlines or hardship, we focus on strengths, needs and reasonable adjustment rather.  It is about potential, contribution and belonging.

Thank you for being part of The Usual Place in your own unique way and for showing, simply by reading this, that our work matters.  Your interest and encouragement help create a community where young people feel valued, seen and supported.

We look forward to moving into 2026 with many more friends and greater optimism for the journey ahead, we hope you will continue this journey with us into the new year and beyond.

Merry Christmas from Everyone at The Usual Place

Craig McEwen, CEO