Case Study | OurCoop: Delivering a Hybrid Annual Members' Meeting Across 7 Sites

Introduction

OurCoop is the UK's largest independent co-operative society, formed on 26th January 2026 when Central Co-op and Midcounties Co-op came together, Central having previously merged with Chelmsford Star Co-op. The result is a single co-operative society with over 1 million members, governed by the democratic participation of its membership.

Each year, OurCoop holds an Annual Members' Meeting (AMM) giving members the opportunity to hear from leadership, vote on key resolutions, and raise questions on matters that affect them. For the first AMM following the merger, the scale and complexity of delivery was unlike anything the three societies had previously managed independently.

The challenge

The 2026 AMM was the first time OurCoop's newly unified membership would come together as a single society. Prior to the merger, each of the three organizations had held their own separate meetings with different styles, formats, and durations. Some had run all-day Saturday events, others had moved to shorter online sessions of under an hour. The challenge was not just about engagement channels, but also about reconciling very different member expectations around length, content, and format.

OurCoop's ambition was clear: any member should be able to join, either online or in person at one of 7 geographically spread sites, while hearing the same key messages from the OurCoop board. At the same time, the meeting needed to break out into regional sessions, allowing members at each of the 7 locations to raise local issues with OurCoop directors distributed across the sites. The goal was for every member, wherever they were, to feel heard.

The solution needed to satisfy several core principles:

• Compliance first - ensuring all eligible members could register, attend, and vote
• Sufficient time for questions at both the broadcast and local level
• Real-time voting outcomes on the night so members felt they had driven the results, not waited days for confirmation

The solution

Lumi Global delivered end-to-end meeting technology across all 7 sites, connecting electronic voting keypads at each satellite venue to a central control desk at Oxford.

Registration was managed centrally across all sites and online, giving OurCoop an accurate and unified attendance record for the entire event.

The meeting was structured in two sessions. Session 1 was run centrally from Oxford, with all satellite locations watching a live broadcast of proceedings. Voting on organization-wide matters including resolutions, approval of accounts, re-election of directors and auditors was conducted simultaneously across all sites, with results displayed in real time. Members could see the outcome of every vote on the night rather than waiting for confirmation after the event.

Session 2 saw the Oxford broadcast pause for satellite venues, which then conducted their own local proceedings independently. OurCoop directors were distributed across each of the 7 sites, allowing members to raise regional issues with local leadership directly. Online attendees continued to watch proceedings at Oxford. This structure gave the meeting both organization-wide and local character simultaneously.

Member questions were managed throughout via the Lumi platform. Each satellite venue had a dedicated OurCoop staff member inputting questions from the room, alongside questions submitted online. All questions were then moderated centrally in Oxford by the membership team before being brought into the meeting. In total, over 100 questions were submitted by members across all locations.

The results

The 2026 OurCoop AMM was successfully delivered across all 7 locations, with strong attendance and active member participation throughout.

• 1,189 total attendees across 7 physical sites and online
• 692 members attended online
• Over 100 questions submitted by members across all locations
• Simultaneous electronic voting delivered across 7 sites in real time
• Live voting results displayed instantly across all locations on the night
• Accurate registration maintained across all sites and online
• Client feedback was overwhelmingly positive

I do not underestimate the technical complexity of what was delivered.

Simon Plunkett, Deputy Society Secretary, OurCoop

Watch Simon discuss the meeting and the wider challenges of member engagement at scale in our on-demand webinar or speak to our team today to find out how we can support your next meeting.