Our History

One long September dawn in 1996 saw our 2 year preparation crystalise into a busy first day's trading. A 2 person working group swelled as we approached a premises, amidst the usual dire warnings of bankruptcy and incomprehension at our plan! Support from the ICOF Co-op Finance Team and friendly backers outweighed the sceptics at the banks. Sales grew quicker than our cautious forecasting and we were quickly recruiting again. Steady growth was matched by amounts of slog done by sometimes weary members. Early sacrifice laid solid capital foundations for the future.

Unicorn follows on from a model devised by Roger Sawtell in the 1980s and used firstly at Daily Bread Co-op, Northampton. Essentially the model revolved around direct, often bulk purchasing, on site processing, and competitive margins and pricing. This all run by motivated owner/members following a clear social agenda.

We've widened the range of goods, particularly in the fresh areas, and our commercial success has taken our members numbers beyond the human sized group sought originally. The model remains however a precious tool to challenge the orthodoxy of multiples with high transport miles, out of town storage, supplier frustration and demoralised staff.

Predictable food scares brought waves of new faces to Unicorn and Gillian McKeith inspired national dietary fervour in 2004/5. This led to growth beyond any forecasting, and a national shortage of sunflower seeds. Reacting to the demand we continued to find more quality products to sell and squeezed more in to our now crammed storage space. Our purchase of the rented site was forced by imminent sale to prospectors but with the loyalty of Unicorn customers £350,000 of loanstock bonds purchased, these were crucial to our financing. We were now the proud owners of a 10,000ft² site (resistant to the "demolish and build flats" idea so widespread now).

Whilst our offer is popular to our catchment area much of the UK has sadly limited choice. Multiple domination of a highly skewed market continues and the New Labour period has seen non-intervention surprising even to (pre-Thatcher) Tory theorists. Cheap food thinking post-1945 has degenerated further into a situation marginal for many primary producers. As multiples drive prices down by squeezing the supply chain consumers are loosing the understanding of how much a product costs to be produced. Someone is ultimately paying the price for the 'cheap' food and the industry is increasingly reliant on continuous new (cheap) and disposable labour sources. The original Rochdale Pioneers were reacting to harsh food market realities and co-operative grocery may well have some relevance yet. As Roger Sawtell foresaw in the 1980s cheap fuel could only be brief and food systems will inevitably step back from high food miles as the costs begin to bite.

Our Statement of Purpose, sets out clearly what we stand for - the challenge is to run a business, which can turn ideas into reality. We are trying to achieve much by conventional standards and we have had some success and hope to inspire others to follow our example.