Manchester’s Eighth Day worker co-operative marks its 55th anniversary in September, with a number of new collaborations and an exhibition charting its history.
It was founded in 1970 by “a group of hippies who were looking for an alternative to what they saw as capitalist consumer culture,” says the organisation. The group set up a craft exchange on New Brown Street – where the Arndale Centre now sits – selling homemade crafts and candles.
“The idea for the name was, ‘on the seventh day God rested, on the eighth day He (She or It) created something better.’”
In 1971, the original building burnt down, and The Eighth Day moved to 111 Oxford Road where it has remained, apart from a few years in the late 1990s when the building was demolished and rebuilt.
It has been run as a workers’ co-op since 1976, with a flat wage structure among all staff (both members and workers). All members are directors and decision-makers, and there are no shareholders. The organisation has had 160 members over its 55 years, with a current cohort of nine plus another 10 workers.
“We’re proud of our history,” says Ian Ford, who has been at the Eighth Day for over 40 years. “We are proud to be part of a movement that’s doing business better. We are Fair Tax certified, and our business model is totally transparent. We’ve been trying to do things better since 1970 and the business is going from strength to strength.”
In the mid-1970s, the team became frustrated with the difficulty of buying healthy, wholefood ingredients in Manchester, and shifted its focus away from crafts. In the mid-1970s, it opened its cafe, selling affordable, wholefood-based meals and today, the shop sells vegetarian and vegan groceries, organic fruit and veg, local beer and organic wine, as well as a range of specialist supplements, herbal remedies and natural skincare and beauty products.
“We buy from a number of workers’ co-ops, namely Suma, Infinity, Essential Trading and Organic North,” says Kathie Higginson, secretary at the Eight Day. “We also try to prioritise using co-operative or ethical businesses for all other services, so for example, all our recycling is done through Emerge, which is a community co-op close to us who do fantastic things in Manchester.”
Over the last few years, the co-op has been trying to diversify its offering – and now offers home deliveries through another local co-op, Chorlton Bike Deliveries – but remains committed to its collaborative model.
Its 50th birthday plans were scuppered by Covid-19, so its 55th celebration has gone large, and includes an exhibition at its site on Oxford Road that shines a light on the history of the Eighth Day and the wider co-operative movement. It has also launched collaborations with local and ethical producers such as Devildog Hot Sauces, Marble Brewery and Choc Affair chocolate.
“The exhibition will run from Monday, 8 September and will run for about a month in our café space,” says Higginson. “We usually display art from local artists on a rotation basis, so it will occupy this space on the walls.”
The pandemic was a challenge, but “Covid actually brought us all closer as a team,” she adds. “As our café space had to close, the café staff began working in the shop… we were wildly overstaffed at points, particularly before the furlough scheme came through, but where there had traditionally been two distinct teams, this actually meant that even after the lockdowns ended, more of our staff were able to work across both areas of the business.
“We now have a more flexible approach to staffing and help each other out more, for example, if the café is short-staffed, the shop staff will help out or do a shift and vice versa. It’s genuinely made the Eighth Day such a lovely place to work.”
