BUSINESS BIO

Where is the enterprise based? Leeds

Key business markets: Social inclusion, services for older and disabled people

Annual turnover: £130,000

% of turnover which is trading income (as opposed to grants): 100%

Number of employees: 36

www.keepinghouse.org.uk

ambassadors

Gill Coupland

Gill Coupland
  • Angels Housekeeping

  • 38

  • Co-founder & director

  • Leeds

There are more older people with greater needs in the UK and public services can’t cope, but Gill Coupland, co-founder of Angels Housekeeping, knows how to meet the demand.

For an elderly person living alone, having regular contact with someone trustworthy and reliable is essential. And if that someone is regularly in the elderly person’s home, it’s even more important.

Angels Housekeeping is a Leeds-based community interest company (CIC) set up in 2005 by Social Enterprise Ambassador Gill Coupland and her friends Sarah Thompson, Julie Hanlon and Susan Yule. It’s a domestic service in demand, responding to an increasingly ageing population in an area where many services that were relied on by older people have been cut.

Not only does it make a house sparkle, but its 36 staff, mainly mums of young children, go out of their way to help their elderly and disabled customers live a full and independent life, without charging them a fortune. This includes anything from a weekly shop to helping fill out a form.

Angels subsidise services for those over 60 or with a disability by charging other customers a fraction more which means they can provide an affordable service with a difference.

“We’re angels by name and angels by nature,” says Gill, whose business now has more than 300 customers. “We clean, but we also do a million other things and, if there’s something we can’t do, we signpost our customers in the right direction and join the dots between different services in Leeds.

"Many of our customers have physical disabilities because of their age, or have dementia, so it helps them be more independent".

I’m so happy I found them. They’re not like cleaners. I’d been in terrible trouble with my arthritis and they are so willing to help.

Most of Angels Housekeeping’s business comes direct from the customer rather than contracts through the local authority, but the local authority is still key to its success thanks to its directory of local cleaning services.

It was also the catalyst that started Angels Housekeeping. After cutting its low-level needs services at the end of 2004, Leeds City Council adult social care department launched Keeping House, an initiative that recruited social enterprises working with older people.

However, the attraction for customers, says Gill, is price and quality rather than social mission.

“We spotted a gap in the market. We didn’t know anything about social enterprise, but we knew about the services,” she says. “I worked in the voluntary sector for many years, running a community group for older people, and my friend ran a cleaning company. We knew what was needed and we knew we’d be good at it. It meant that social enterprise found us.

“But the reason our customers think we’re fantastic is that our staff are lovely, they’re reliable, they can be trusted. They turn up on the same day every week at the right time,” she says.

No one agrees more than 81-year-old Irene Levy, whose mobility is restricted by severe arthritis. “I’m so happy I found them,” she says. “They’re not like cleaners. I’d been in terrible trouble with my arthritis and they are so willing to help.

“They mean everything to me. They’re honest and lovely people and it’s lovely to know there’s someone trustworthy I can rely on.”

Quick Facts

  • From small beginnings Angels Housekeeping now has more than 300 customers.
  • Angels Housekeeping is on track to claim £100,000 in benefits for its customers this year.
  • One of Angels Housekeeping’s strangest requests was to find a new home for a parrot while the owner was in hospital. They succeeded!

Print