Funding the Future: Six Years of LEAP Investments

November sees the sixth anniversary of the first LEAP loans being drawn down, marking the start of a social investment programme that has so far invested over  £1.3 million pounds in small scale agroecological food businesses. 

To mark this milestone, we commissioned a series of short films looking at the experience of four of the businesses LEAP has invested in, some from the early days and some more recent, to hear more about the impact the investment has made. The businesses featured are diverse in geography, structure, and scale, but they share a commitment to building food systems rooted in place, fairness and ecological integrity. 

We hear from Helen of the Kindling Trust, where LEAP investment helped transform a council nursery into a thriving market garden on the edge of Greater Manchester. Hamish, from Middle Ground Growers in Bath, reflects on the pressures of expansion and the importance of care in how a business grows. At Tyddyn Teg in North Wales, Alice speaks about cooperative governance, collective decision-making, and the tensions that come with trying to do things differently. And in West Wales, Abel, one of the founders of Glasbren, shares what it’s like to keep a market garden going — and the value of finance that gives you time, not just targets.

Across these conversations, certain themes recur. Several people speak about the emotional labour of running a business with a social mission. Some describe the space that LEAP finance gave them to consolidate, reflect, or reset. Others focus on the structure of the investment itself — the interest cap, the social impact grant, the regular check-ins — as being key to feeling supported and seen.

If you’re thinking of applying to LEAP, we hope these stories may help you decide whether it’s a good fit. And if you’re involved in shaping policy or funding in this space, we hope they add to the conversation about how small-scale food enterprises can be supported to build something lasting — not just viable, but valuable. We’d love to hear from you!