An award-winning organisation providing housing and support for thousands of women and children escaping domestic violence is expanding its purpose-built HQ, Purple House, thanks to finance from longstanding banking partner Unity.

The Winner Group started life in the late 1990s when a handful of volunteers from the Preston Road Estate came together to support women in crisis.

Now a multi-million pound enterprise with a portfolio of 180 properties, it provides flexible short and long-term accommodation and an array of services including specialist domestic abuse support, a charity shop, training centre, not-for-profit law firm and free nursery places for women accessing services.

Winner first banked with Unity over a decade ago after the organisation secured a £1 million grant through the Government’s Empty Homes programme and wanted to match it with finance.

Lisa Hilder MBE, Treasurer and founding member, said: “We shopped around for a social purpose bank and Unity lent us £980,000 to help multiply the benefit that we could achieve.

“Bringing all these homes back into use to help women was the beginning of our relationship. Unity worked with us and understood our aspirations. Some banks are only concerned about the money side of things whereas Unity is genuinely interested in helping customers to develop and grow.

“If we ever have an issue we always get help really quickly through the call centre or through our Relationship Manager Michael Wicks.”

Impact:

Winner Group’s 42-strong female workforce – some of whom are previous service users – are based at Purple House in Preston Road. The building’s purple, green and white colours are in homage to the Suffragette movement and its feminist ethos.

The expansion will create additional storage space for the charity shop which serves the whole Preston Road Estate. It’s an area of high deprivation and all items are 50p.

There will also be extra office space for providing affordable legal advice.

Lisa said: “Around one in four women will be in a violent relationship at some point.

“Typically, when a woman comes to us, she’s in crisis. She’s stressed and worried about her children. She might have physical injuries and she doesn’t know which way is up. She’s anxious and in tears.

“After that first conversation with us, you can see her physically start relaxing; understanding that there is hope and that she’s not stuck in whatever hell she’s been experiencing.

“From there everything we do is about helping her rediscover her own identity, take back control and rebuild a safe life.

“By the time we’ve finished working with her, she’s a different woman. She’s relaxed, happy, can articulate what her hopes and goals are and her children are happy too.”