SCD - chapter 2

Aim

SCD is now 7yrs old! What a journey & together we've achieved so much. We now need your support for chapter 2 as we've 'only just begun..'

With your partnership today we can help SCD leap into the next chapter of life and help more people find joy, friendship, awesome dance skills and improved health, whilst regenerating our town centre...

WE'VE ONLY JUST BEGUN...

We just can't believe that together we’ve done so much #DANCINGFORGOOD in 7 years...THANK YOU!

In August 2019 we began with a Crowdfunder which helped us kick off and now we are seeking community investment again so, together we can make an even more exciting chapter 2. 

Together, with our community, we transformed a massive empty Two-Storey Mothercare into an all inclusive dance centre and into one of the biggest dancing communities in London! Our aim was to help as many people as possible find a better life through dancing and we've gone a long way already!

It's our absolute joy to be a unique creative arts and dance home for over 1000 people of all ages and backgrounds each week. We have members from over 30 countries, people dancing each week from 18 months to 90 years old and we run over 85 classes per week. But there's much more we want to do..

[Photo: Showing the transformation possible by our first Crowdfunder in 2019]

OUR ASK RIGHT NOW..

Since opening in 2019 we've had over 10,000 people dance with us!
It's been an amazing journey and we are so excited about the next 7 years, but we really need you! We've always said 'It takes a village...' and thats more true than ever...

We are running this exciting new Crowdfunder, packed with amazing rewards to help us do 3 things:

1. Create 'FUEL' a brand new eco friendly, inclusive SCD cafe space
a. Giving current and future visitors an even more welcoming, safe and friendly space to meet up, connect and enjoy refreshments, utilising some of our empty spaces. This uses our space far better, brings more of our vision to life AND helps us become more sustainable through...

b.Creating more paid work opportunities and work experience for a wide range of people in our community to gain valuable skills, including our friends with additional needs.

c. Financially growing our income AND saving on our costs through inefficient energy use. For example, just to provide drinking water currently costs us over £400 per month as we have no plumbing on our lower floor.

- Anyone excited about having our first ever proper coffee machine and totally unique (watch this space) smoothie maker?!

2. Making our studios even more inclusive

a. As we keep growing, we create more noise and we really need to add better soundproofing to our studios, so we can do even more and so people don't get disturbed when concentrating on their own moves.

b. As we keep growing each month we need extra equipment people use when dancing with us, like more ear defenders for friends with additional needs and, we want to improve our flooring so its better for all physical abilities.

c. Some of our bigger equipment is fully life expired now and needs full replacement and this includes our Air Conditioning system!

3. Setting up new inclusion projects for all ages

a. Investment will help us by adding more team time and creating more formalised programmes and progression opportunities, as well as events and projects for people who still find too many barriers stopping them from dancing. This also includes projects where we can help people such as lone parents join in by providing more opportunities in the evenings for younger children alongside adult dance classes too.

b. With inclusion and removing barriers to dance being our core focus, we want to freshly invest into our programmes, creating even more opportunities to dance and exercise together, for more people across all age groups.

WHY WE NEED HELP TO DO THESE 3 THINGS - REGENERATING TOGETHER

We chose a central location for SCD as we passionately believe in our town centre and the importance of people coming together, supporting local businesses and keeping the energy ad footfall growing. 

So the SCD vision was (and is) all about getting creative, improving our health together, playing our part in regenerating the high street AND making lots of friends and new memories along the way.

We had a brilliantly successful Crowdfunder to help us launch in 2019 and this money paid for our walls and some of our equipment. Since then we've not taken money from any sources apart from our fees and from the Director's family investment to help us keep moving through Covid challenges!

The Directors have no shares as this is very much a community owned company, a Community Interest Company and we are fully ensuring everything is given away to our community within our charity registration process too. 

We try to make every £ go as far as possible - as a non profit, investing everything back into this AWESOME community. 

OUR IMPACT TOGETHER OVER 7 YEARS

We BROUGHT NEW LIFE to A BIG EMPTY SHOP and turned it into one OF LONDON’S BIGGEST DANCE CENTRES with over 800 dancing members of all ages. 

* Created a SAFE SPACE where over 60 dancers with ADDITIONAL NEEDS take part in classes each week and where over 80 of our community's most vulnerable people attend weekly group sessions hosted by SCD. This includes victims of domestic violence, refugees and local people living on very low incomes.

* GROWN OUR CREATIVITY, WELLBEING AND BROUGHT 1000'S OF us back every week to the TOWN CENTRE. Over 70% of our members say they visited the high street less than once a month before joining weekly classes.

* Brought INVESTMENT INTO THE LOCAL ECONOMY. With the money we pay our team, our rent, the local suppliers we use AND the money our members spend in the town centre, when they visit... every year SCD brings around £1 MILLION back into the town centre! 

* RAISED OVER £60,000 TOGETHER FOR GOOD CAUSES and Given over 3,000 HOURS free STUDIO SPACE TO LOCAL PARTNERS.

*CREATED WEEKLY PAID WORK 30 people each month; fantastic dance artists and teachers as well as wonderful administrators, cleaners and fitness coaches.

* PROUD TO SURVIVE...We've beaten the odds to keep a new high street venue, not for profit organisation alive and kicking despite a pandemic and a cost of living crisis! Stats show that 60% of new businesses fail within 5 years!

It's not been without its challenges:
* Just 6 months into our life when we'd made our main investments, we had to close for Covid lockdowns and this still has a knock on for us today.
* Despite being a popular organisation and despite so much community support, we've struggled with venue uncertainty which has limited our ability to access funding. More on this on our website!
* Being in an older space with full responsibility for everything inside the walls, we've continued to fix up, repair and make good, doing all the work we possibly can ourselves to try and keep SCD evolving.
* Despite the cost of living and recent financial pressures we've worked our very hardest not to increase prices so we can stay as accessible as possible.
* SCD launched as a non profit, a Community Interest Company as our passion is to be as generous and accessible as we can. We began the charity registration process as many trusts fund exactly what we do, for charities, but current delays at the Charity Commission mean we are still waiting for our registration to come through, after many months waiting. We now expect this to complete around November 2026.

[Video: Our Dance Inc class performance in July 2025]

CAN YOU SUPPORT SCD CHAPTER 2?

We aren't just asking for your goodwill here...every single investment you make will unlock a reward, so checkout all the reward options.

AND remember we are strongly hoping here that every £1 will be match funded as well.

>>Please get involved now as we celebrate 7 years and move forward together into an even more exciting future!

Join us here as an individual, a family, a community group or business.

THANK YOU

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 9th August 2026 at 9:35am