Making It Work: Getting creative helps social enterprise Loaf to rise

Loaf Catering used to earn most of its revenue via cafés – but Loaf Pottery, available to buy online, has generated vital income for the firm in 2020

Maeve Monaghan: ‘There has been a groundswell of support for buying local and buying social this year, and Loaf Pottery has been able to deliver on that’

The pandemic has opened up unexpected opportunities for a social enterprise in Belfast employing 60 people with learning difficulties and autism.

Up until this year, Loaf Catering earned its bread-and-butter revenues through a network of six cafés in the North, and by catering for corporate customers. With its core business hit hard by lockdown and social distancing restrictions, a creative offshoot of the main business is now taking centre stage.

Loaf Pottery and Coffee Shop ...