The more useful comparison is CIC/CLG, in which there isn’t much practical difference, afaik.
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I’m not sure either.
Hence bringing it up.
We can look at this two ways.
- See which type of company we meet the requirements for and be that.
- Chose which type of business we want to be and work out what we need to do to change to meet the requirements of that type.
Either are acceptable if we have something in mind.
I guess I was implying that my question was the simpler form above,in the opening question, but didn’t state it explicitly. So it may have lead to some confusion.
in essence I believe we should probably chose one of these soon, pending governance meeting(s) and start working towards that.
This wasn’t really supposed to be the answer to that question but potentially the beginning of that conversation in an open setting.
As Director I would want to see some fairly sizeable advantages to the CIC model in order to switch from CLG.
Charitable status is orders of magnitude more complex/difficult and is a long-term project, if it’s even viable.
Dear all, I am in the process of setting up a CIC or Social Initiative Company for Kids Kreate.
I’ve found that setting up a Charity is by far the most difficult because the application process is tightly stringent now.
I hate to say this is partly/hugely because of KidsCo where I volunteered for 8 years working in all departments. The good work done was exceptional but the collapse negated most of it!
The charitable sector has been very badly damaged by them, in particular for children & vulnerable adults. However the application process is the same for all Charities.
CIC is one good way to go because that is the current trend and it’s a good thing as people are really beginning to look after each other better in our communities.
It’s a lot of research/paperwork and I’m happy to pass on the things I know and can help proofreading/legalities if you’d like. It’s not my place to get involved any further than that though, I’m a new member and this potential change is for members who’ve been here a while because you fully understand what MakerSpace needs.
Jackie 
I think the best argument for charity status is that Create Space have got it.
However I think we need to look at the benefits of CIC and Charity status to see how many of the reasons we want to be a Charity like the 80% rates reduction are applicable to CICs.
The long and the short is yes, @boldaslove is right it’s easier than ever to set up a company, but we’d need to know that translating to another companies house regulated object would be of any benefit to us, I’m not convinced it would be.
Charities on the other hand are rightly highly regulated and harder than ever before to set up, but the community benefits would be different in this case and we need to have a longer term think about whether this is a good fit for us and what the implications are.