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A Successful Special Members Meeting 21st September

Thanks to those members who attended and those who gave a proxy vote to another member or sent this to our Chair. The meeting was quorate and able to adopt the new set of Rules for governance, with thanks to MC member Marie-Amélie Viatte for working through these with the welcomed support of Community Shares Scotland – huge thanks to Morven at CSS too. 

The Rules lay out governance for Dig-in and can be found on our website. We are in the process of lodging these with the Financial Conduct Authority.

The Special Members Meeting gave members an update on the past 6 months given the challenges we had brought to members and supporters last year in remaining sustainable as a community business. Our chair Amanda Lake opened with a thanks and celebration of the the past few months which had seen Dig-In be able to turn a monthly profit after many months. Our Treasurer, Sue Lane,  introduced the July Management Accounts and the summary accounts for the previous 5 Years, highlighting the issues being addressed by the Management Committee since on-boarding in March this year. 

Will Sohler, MC Retail lead,  gave a Strategic Update and introduction to sales at Dig-in. Members questioned the MC and there was really useful constructive discussion. Following an overview of the proposal from Melanie Mail, the meeting welcomed the decision to run a new share issue to raise funds to take Dig-In forward over the next 5 years, allowing for renovation and modernisation of the shop including a new Electronic Point of Sale system, chillers to keep stock fresh in warm weather and renovation and increased shelving for stock. This is now to be scheduled in early 2024. We were very happy to elect Will Sohler to the Management Committee (see below).

Share issue delayed

As many of you will have heard, Dig-In was planning to run a Share Offer from the end of October to raise much needed funds to develop the business over the next 5 years.

Unfortunately the Management Committee has had to take the decision to delay the new share Offer until hopefully early next year.   We have all agreed that at this point in time, other management committee decisions are taking more time than anticipated, and we would like to run the three week share issue when we can devote all our time to making it a success. 

We know many members were looking forward to the launch and many supporters have expressed interest in joining Dig-In during the Offer and we are very sorry to have to put the offer on hold. 

However this does not prevent anyone purchasing shares now, and becoming a member,  they would like to do so.   You can do so on our website

Introducing Will! 

Will moved to the Bruntsfield area with his wife at the start of 2023. After looking at a few volunteering opportunities, he discovered Dig-In. Will joined at the start of March as a shop volunteer and soon became drawn into the shop’s day to day activities.

Will’s background in sales and marketing has been key to improvements in the shop and increasing sales over 2023. In April he took on responsibility for managing our ever-growing pool of amazing volunteers. Over the summer he spent many hours on the shop floor, build relationships with customers, and test new ways of growing our footfall. He recently agreed to take on the role of Dig-In MC Retail Lead, which involves working closely with the shop staff and shop volunteers to develop the business.

What motivates him to volunteer with Dig-In? 

‘I love rooting for the underdog and we mustn’t underestimate the positive impact shops like Dig-In have on the community. Dig-In will survive and prosper!’

Tasty advent cheer!

What will be your choice this year, Traditional chocolate or tasty teas?

This year we have six lovely Advent Calendars for you and your family to start on 1st December to count down the days to Christmas: Fair trade Divine (Milk and Dark chocolate), H!P Oat Milk, Pukka Tea and 2 designs of Yogi Tea advent calendars. Something for all members of the family. Stock is limited so please visit us soon to avoid disappointment.

Christmas time is traditionally the busiest time in retail on the local high street, and key to success for local shops, like Dig-In. Heaps of other seasonal goodies will be appearing in the shop – hot chocolate, gourmet popcorn, mulled wine and cider spices, chocolate coins, gift sets of Scottish Oils and Seaweed to name a few. We look forward to seeing you in the shop for your seasonal fruit and veg and some
lovely treats .

Sweet potato and black bean chilli with quinoa

A warming plant based chilli, good for you and the planet! Come by to say hi and pick up your ingredients. Thanks for volunteer Pauline for compiling and testing it out! Image above from BBCGoodFood. 

Serves 3
1 tbsp. olive oil or rapeseed oil | 2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 in cubes |
1 onion, chopped | 3 cloves garlic, crushed | 1 red chilli, (seeds removed if you don’t like it too hot) and finely chopped |  Small bunch coriander, stalks finely chopped, leaves roughly chopped (keep them separate) | 2 tsp ground coriander | 2 tsp ground cumin | 2 tsp chipotle paste | 1 heaped tbsp. yeast extract | 2 cans 400g tomatoes | 400g can black beans | 140g quinoa, cooked according to pack instructions | Zest and juice of 1 lime | 1 tbsp pumpkin seed

Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Toss the sweet potatoes with half the oil and some seasoning on a baking tray. Bake for 30 mins, tossing halfway through cooking, until tender.

Meanwhile, heat the remaining oil in a pan, add the onion and cook for 5 mins until soft, then add the garlic, chilli and coriander stalks. Cook for a further 2-3 mins, stirring to prevent burning. Sprinkle in the spices, stirring for 1 min more, until aromatic. Add in the chipotle paste (you can get this from Lupe Pintos, down the road!), yeast extract, tomatoes and half a can of water, swirling it around the tin to wash out all the bits of tomato. Simmer the sauce, uncovered, while the sweet potato is cooking, adding a splash more water if it looks too dry. Add the sweet potato, black beans and seasoning to the chilli. Bubble for 5 mins, then taste and adjust the seasoning with a squeeze of lime and a sprinkle of sugar if it needs it. Meanwhile, stir the lime zest, a squeeze of lime juice, the coriander leaves and the pumpkin seeds into the quinoa.

Toss the avocado in the remaining lime juice as soon as you’ve cut it – this will prevent it turning brown. To serve, divide the quinoa between plates or bowls, top with the chilli and some optional sliced avocado. Recipe from BBC Goodfood here. 

We are delighted to welcome Maxime Swift, a previous Dig-In volunteer, as our new part-time Shop Supervisor.

Maxime brings experience in food network and sustainability projects – she has been involved in the student-led social enterprise Slurp Edinburgh, which engages individuals affected by homelessness. She is also a Veg Advocate for Scotland with the Peas Please Project, led by Nourish Scotland, who ran a workshop with our team of staff and volunteers last year. Maxime will graduate from Edinburgh University this summer.  Please join us in welcoming Maxime!

We were sorry to say goodbye to Steph Marsden, who has worked with us since March 2019. She is moving up and onwards into an exciting new role with one of our organic suppliers, Locavore Trading. Check out their exciting ‘Bigger Plan‘ which they launched this year.

Spring vegetables – making it through the hungry gap

Lovely seasonal organic purple sprouting broccoli from Yorkshire have been brightening our shelves for a few weeks but will not last long! We have had the start of fabulous organic salad leaves grown locally by the Free Company out by Balerno, currently supplies a bit intermittent but will become more regular as the weather warms up.

We are still stocking wonderful local root veg, dirty carrots from Fife are wonderful as ever, and we still have a good selection of Scottish grown potatoes. Looking forward to local rhubarb soon. Our honey from Midlothian Honey is very popular, expect new season stock as we get into summer.

We are noticing a small price increase overall with fresh fruit and veg, and that some stock may be a slightly longer time in transit, so we are checking our prices carefully, working closely with our suppliers and increasing quality checks. 

A massive thank you to everyone who attended our online AGM last month. While we missed having our usual snacks and blethers, it was still lovely to see you all and thanks to everyone who made personalised thank you signs to share on our screens.

We also welcomed Carl Emery to our Management Committee. Carl has been volunteering with Diane, our Treasurer and is excited to get more involved in the financial and business side of things. Welcome Carl!

We are all looking forward to lockdown easing and hopefully we can relax a little over the summer and get to socialise more with friends and family.

Unfortunately social distancing and mask wearing look here to stay for a while, so not much will change in how we shop at Dig-In. We will be back having tastings and outreach events when it is safe to do so!

Thanks for all your support.

The Dig-In team xxx

We want to take this opportunity to wish our community, our members, supporters and shoppers a happy and healthy festive season. It has been a year like no other and we want to take this moment to reflect on the last 9 months, and express our gratitude for everyone that has been part of our ongoing resilience and enabled us to continue to be your local high street greengrocer.

A BIG THANK YOU to…

…our incredible staff team: Morag Deans, Claire Hutchins, Steph Marsden, Struan Johnston and Lina Alkhatib (welcome to our team!). Your hard work, dedication, flexibility and support for each other has meant we haven’t had to close the shop once since the pandemic started. The shelves have been stocked and volunteers supported in adjusting to new rhythms and systems. You’ve been working away behind the scenes, doing all the things that need doing to keep our doors open, with such a positive and can do attitude. 

…our volunteers: those serving customers, making deliveries to those in need, on our Management Committee, keeping track of the ever changing guidelines and legislation and supporting the staff to make their jobs as safe as possible. Especially our new MC members Fiona Liddle and Ann McFall, who joined us at the last AGM, just before the pandemic hit, and have yet to join a physical meeting!

…our trusty suppliers: from old stalwarts Greencity Wholefoods to new start-ups Untitled Oats and Cave Coffee, we have been so grateful to our key food workers across the supply chain, in the fields, factories, warehouses and delivery vans, keeping our shelves stocked.

…our community and customers, for being patient as we brought in new systems and increased queuing times, for being kind and good humoured with our team and your ongoing support. THANK YOU ALL!

Fruit and Veg Boxes

From being a relatively discreet part of our business for the last few years, our veg box subscriptions increased hugely at the beginning of lockdown. We went from doing about 15 veg boxes per week in March to about 55 per week in May. 30% of those veg boxes were deliveries, at no extra cost, by staff and volunteers, to those shielding at home. This meant closing the shop to regular shopping on Fridays as our wee shop couldn’t fit all the boxes and humans in at once. 

While some of you have been itching to get back into the shop once restrictions eased, we have seen box numbers decrease and we are glad to now be open again to regular shopping on Friday. We are happy to continue this service for those who prefer it. 

Winter Updates

Sunday openings up to Christmas

We know with the cold, dark and dreich winter weather, queuing outside is distinctly less fun than in the summer. We have decided to open from 12-4pm on Sundays in the lead up to Christmas to give everyone more space and time to pick up their Christmas shopping. 

Pre-order your Christmas veg

As in previous years, you will be able to pre-order your Christmas veg, just ask in the shop for a form or fill in and email to us at orders@diginbruntsfield.co.uk. 

Quiet times for shopping

If you are wanting to pop in and are worried about queuing or waiting, we tend to be quieter on weekday mornings and Sunday afternoons.

Christmas Opening Hours

What’s coming up in 2021?

Save the Date!

Dig-In’s 8th AGM – Greens, Grapefruit and Gratitude

8th February 2021 – 7-9pm – online 

We are looking for new Management Committee members and any motions. 

Register via the Eventbrite page.

How are we faring?

Our financial year end was at the end of August 2020. Our draft annual accounts will be made available to members for approval at the AGM. 

Whilst the annual accounts are not yet finalised, we wanted to share with you that despite the challenges of the past few months we did see a sales increase of 13% compared to the previous year which underlines how important Dig-In continues to be to the community. 

We are incredibly grateful we have not had to close our doors this year and while our costs have also seen a significant increase, we are anticipating a small profit for the year.

Contribution to Edinburgh Food Social

We are collecting donations in the shop for Edinburgh Food Social, who are delivering nutritious dinners to as many folk as possible, with a specific drive over the Christmas period. We’ve agreed to match fund up to £100 raised through the collection as well. 

All our love,

All the team at Dig-In xxx

We’ve now extended our opening hours on the days we make up our veg boxes in order to allow extended public access to the shop on Thursdays and Fridays. A big thanks to our staff and volunteers who have amended their shifts to start earlier in order to allow us to do this!

Opening hours are now as follows:

Monday – Wednesday: 10 am – 6 pm 
Thursday: 10 am – 6 pm
Friday: 11 am – 6 pm
Saturday: 10.00 am – 5 pm
Sunday: Closed

Please note: We also close the shop while we process deliveries and to clean and re-stock the shelves (often around lunch-time). When we do this we will put our expected opening time on the clock on our door.
Opening hours are subject to change at short notice due to staff and volunteer availability. Keep an eye on the door and our Facebook page for regular updates.

After discussion with staff and volunteers, we are now able to slightly extend our open hours to make the shop accessible to the public once again on a Friday afternoon.

New Opening hours wef 20/07/2020

We thank you for your continued support and co-operation over the past months as we have implemented changes to keep Dig-In open and operating safely. We would also like to remind all shop customers that is essential to continue to follow governmental guidance in wearing face coverings and to enact 2 metres social – distancing whilst within the shop, to keep our volunteer workers and community as safe as possible.

Many thanks

Dig-In Staff and Management Committee

After discussion with staff and volunteers, we want to make the Dig-In shopping experience safer and better for all customers with less waiting time, and manage our vegbag collections more effectively. Therefore, we are setting aside some time for Fruit/Veg Bag collection only.

Dig-In will be closed to the public and regular shoppers on Fridays from May 8th, with pre-ordered Fruit/Veg bags being made up for local delivery and collection.

Customers collecting their exisiting orders will be restricted to the front of shop area, with one customer admitted at a time. Those collecting will also be able to purchase 3 additional items.

If you currently collect a veg box from us on a Friday, we will be in touch shortly to confirm your two-hour collection slot.

Due to unprecedented demand, we are currently not accepting new veg box customer requests, but plan to reopen our registration system soon. Please keep an eye on our Veg Box page for details.

New Opening hours (wef 4/05/2020)

We thank you for your continued support and co-operation over the past weeks and as we implement these changes.

We would also like to take this opportunity to remind all shop customers that is essential to continue to follow governmental guidance and enact 2 metres social – distancing whilst within the shop, to keep our volunteer workers as safe as possible.

Many thanks

Dig-In Staff and Management Committee