• Founded in London in 1991 by Gordon Roddick and John Bird with start-up funding from the Body Shop Foundation, The Big Issue is one of the great publishing successes of recent years. The Big Issue South West published its first edition in November 1993 after being invited into the region by the town centre managers of Bath who wished to combat a growing begging problem.

• The Big Issue South West, which published its first edition in November 1993, provides an inspiring mix of cutting edge news of both national and regional relevance, often breaking exclusive stories which are picked up by the rest of the media, as well as campaigns, hard hitting exposes, entertainment news, arts reviews and general interest features.

• The Big Issue South West is at the forefront of promoting new talent in music and the arts, and has a reputation for big name celebrity exclusives. Street Lights is a weekly forum for the views and work of homeless contributors, the only platform for their voice in the media. We welcome contributions from all homeless organisations in the South West.

• We are a social business dedicated to creating opportunities for homeless people to earn an income and participate in society through selling The Big Issue South West magazine. We operate with business principles but also have a social mission to provide working opportunities to our vendors; our business mission is to create a profit which is used to improve the product that we sell to our vendors. Vendors buy the magazine from us for 75p and sell it to the public for £1.50p.

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