Dartington Trust has turned the corner and achieved “financial stability” less than a year after teetering on the brink of administration, the chair and acting CEO have said.
Reviewing the last six months at the charity in an open letter, Chair Lord Triesman and CEO Robert Fedder said achieving financial stability while ensuring a sustainable future had “undeniably been a slog”, but that this had safeguarded 200 jobs and would generate a surplus to reinvest in new projects.
Referring to the “dark days” of 2023, when the Trust was on the edge of financial collapse, the statement said: “There is little to learn from looking back to the dark days of last year, when one former trustee suggested they might buy Dartington Estate for £1 in the event that we fell into administration.
“Less than a year ago we were within a few weeks of not meeting payroll; now, not only has a fresh management approach saved more than 200 local jobs, it has also created a number of new ones.”
It noted that staff at the Trust “have worked extremely hard” and added: “Our early success has been in significantly reducing losses and mapping the route to breakeven, so that we are able to reinvest from surpluses we have generated ourselves, not solely from external sources.”
To highlight the positive changes at Dartington, the Trust announced that The Green Table cafe will be relaunched in July and that a “transformed” White Hart restaurant will showcase the talents of multi-award winning local chef, Charlotte Vincent.
Among the forthcoming events, the two highlighted this month’s Byline Festival and the Summer School.
Mr Fedder took over the job in July 2023, when the Trust was thrown into turmoil following a string of highly publicised incidents, including protests over the postponement of courses and the imposition of flexible work contracts, and when the future of the school was thrown into doubt after its artistic director decided to quit.
According to the findings of a review, almost every arts event at the time was losing money along with Dartington’s retail centre and hospitality outlets.