Caring store owner wins Community Champion national retail award

Trudy Davies, who owns Woosnam and Davies News, took the title of Community Champion at the exclusive 2023 Fed Awards.

The Fed (Federation of Independent Retailers) is a not-for-profit organisation with more than 10,000 members throughout the UK and Republic of Ireland.

The glittering ceremony was hosted by BBC presenter Naga Munchetty at London’s Royal Lancaster Hotel on January 24.

The list of local groups and national organisations that Trudy and her team have helped over the years is endless but includes numerous charities through the Rotary Club; the Llanidloes Hanging Gardens community project; the local football club; Kelly’s Cats; the Dogs Trust and Rhayader Wildlife Rescue, to name just a few.

Trudy said: “The pandemic meant we had to revaluate how we conduct our business in many ways. Our main objectives were keeping the community and staff safe, ensuring the business is constantly adapting to the changes in retail and helping the high street and community thrive and succeed in these difficult times.

“To achieve these objectives we introduced free deliveries for daily papers and goods and substantially increased telephone orders to keep our customers safe.

“We started a scheme for key workers and volunteers so that they could have a free hot drink in our store. We replaced this with ice cream in the summer and have continued with bottles of water or hot drinks. We also had a collaboration with suppliers where we gave out free chocolate bars with this.”

Other initiatives included offering free bread to anyone in need and setting up a hub for collecting and distributing handmade facemasks to hospitals and care givers.

Trudy added: “We went out and collected wool in the local area for baby hats, gloves and blankets to be made for charity and we’ve sent over 5,000 items to hospitals locally and nationally.

“Since Covid, we introduced a jigsaw swap in the shop, so customers could come in with their old jigsaws and exchange them for a different one in store.

“We sold plants and produce donated by our customers, with the money going to good causes such as defibrillators for the local community. We have now got two defibs in town.

“In collaboration with Danielle Baird, we have purchased two bleed kits for our town and are proud to say we are the first ones in Wales to have these for public use. We continue to fundraise for more bleed kits by selling plants.”

Trudy is also the secretary of the group that runs the Millennium Community Garden in Llanidloes and is a Royal British Legion standard bearer, representing the town for 41 years, and Poppy Appeal collector.

The Fed’s national president, Jason Birks, said: “Trudy and her team at Woosnam and Davies have gone far more than the extra mile for their community and are very deserving of our Community Champion award.

“They demonstrate commitment to every facet of the community, day in, day out, with an exhaustive list of activities and initiatives.

“Support is given to everyone and everything, from Dementia Friends to the Dogs Trust and from the Carnival Committee to a Community Fridge, while the installation of defibrillators and bleed kits are major contributions to care and safety in the area.”