Who we are

A community built around water.

Everyone Swims CIC is a not-for-profit Community Interest Company founded in Cheltenham to make swimming genuinely accessible — not just affordable on paper.

Our mission

We advance health, wellbeing and education through swimming.

Access to swimming is unequal. Children from lower-income families are significantly less likely to be able to swim. Adults face barriers of cost, confidence, disability and language. We exist to change that — systematically, not just symbolically.

As a Community Interest Company, our assets are locked to the community purpose. Any surplus is reinvested directly into subsidised lesson places and community programmes. We publish our annual CIC report and operate with full transparency.

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Ally, founder of Everyone Swims CIC

Governance

Our four objects

These are the four objects from our Articles of Association — the legal foundation of everything we do.

Advance health & wellbeing

Through swimming and aquatic activity, improving physical and mental health outcomes across the community.

Advance education

Through swimming and water safety, equipping people of all ages with life-saving skills and aquatic confidence.

Promote equality

Reducing barriers to participation — cost, disability, language, culture — and increasing equal access to aquatic activity.

Provide community facilities

Supporting and advocating for community-owned swimming pools and aquatic facilities across the UK.

What we stand for

Seven values shape every lesson we run.

Every poolside decision — who we teach, how we teach, what we charge — is measured against these values. They are the reason we exist as a CIC, not a private business.

Read our story →

Achievement

Inclusion

Safety

Confidence

Community

Wellbeing

Courage

Our story

Founded by someone who believes swimming changes lives.

Ally founded Everyone Swims CIC after working across community settings and seeing the same barriers come up again and again — cost, confidence, disability, culture. People who wanted to swim but couldn't access it.

With a background in architecture and systems design, Ally built a model that puts inclusion first — where subsidised places aren't an afterthought but are woven into the structure of every programme.

100+ workshops later, Everyone Swims operates across six venues in Cheltenham, Gloucester, the Forest of Dean and Cardiff — with more locations in development.

Not-for-profit CIC

Every penny into the mission.

Asset-locked

Cannot be privatised.

Annual report

Published each year.

Community swimming session in action

Ready to get in the water?

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