For a number of years this music and arts venue along North Promenade was the heart of the community
When? 2016-2020
Moon on the Water (MOTW) was a social enterprise based on the North Promenade in Cleethorpes which provided a music and performing arts venue with a vegan cafĂ© and bar. The venture aimed to improve access to arts and culture and support and encourage local musicians, artists and arts groups.Â
Big Local North Cleethorpes was supportive of and connected to MOTW since before it opened. It was run by Warren Jolly as an independent social enterprise.
Funding support for Moon on the Water came in two stages. Initially, a capital grant was provided to help the building meet the minimum legal health and safety and food hygiene standards necessary in order to open. With the venture up and running, the second phase of support enabled the purchase of state of the art PA and stage lighting equipment to enable the staging of a wide range of jazz, blues and rock music events.
Big Local support for MOTW has enabled the venture to lever in other funding support and it has also benefitted from a significant level of volunteer input with over 5,000 hours of volunteering recorded which, based on the average wage for North East Lincolnshire, has a market value of over ÂŁ75,000.
Big Local North Cleethorpes made further small investments into MOTW over the years – new mixing desk; improved lighting; a lease on Point of Sale equipment. The Big Local team also supported the directors of MOTW with funding applications and groups such as VANEL hosted meetings in the venue to keep it supported.
Comments from the team at Moon on the Water:
Without Big Local we wouldn’t be where we are now
Despite huge success and a number of large scale music events, and a refurbishment during 2019 which improve the stage and layout, cashflow issues finally meant that MOTW closed its doors mid 2020. Covid lockdown had a huge impact – meaning that whilst many running costs remained, income dropped to near zero during covid. Despite the support of their landlord, there was ultimately no way to make the venue remain sustainable and the team finally had to close the venue.
