The Sheffield Co-operative Society was a local consumer co-operative trading in Sheffield

Sheffield

Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...

, South Yorkshire

South Yorkshire

South Yorkshire is a metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It has a population of 1.29 million. It consists of four metropolitan boroughs: Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham, and City of Sheffield...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

The Society was founded as the Brightside and Carbrook Co-operative and opened its first shop in 1868, in the Carbrook

Carbrook, South Yorkshire

Carbrook is an industrial area of Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England to the north-east of Brightside. The suburb is named for the Carr Brook, which ran through the area until the late eighteenth century....

 suburb of Sheffield.

Castle House

The Co-op opened shops around the city, and set up its first branch in Sheffield City Centre

Sheffield City Centre

Sheffield City Centre—often just referred to as town—is a district of the City of Sheffield, and part of the Sheffield Central ward. It includes the area that is within a radius of roughly of Sheffield Cathedral, and is encircled by the Inner Ring Road—a circular route started in the late 1960s...

 in 1929, on the corner of Exchange Street and Waingate, on part of the former site of Sheffield Castle

Sheffield Castle

Sheffield Castle was a castle in Sheffield, England, constructed at the confluence of the River Sheaf and the River Don, possibly on the site of a former Anglo-Saxon long house, and dominating the early town. A motte and bailey castle had been constructed on the site at some time in the century...

. In 1962, this moved to a new site named "Castle House", in tribute to the site of the old store.

The Castle House department store was designed by G. S Hay of the Co-operative Wholesale Society

Co-operative wholesale society

A Co-operative Wholesale Society, or CWS, is a form of Co-operative Federation , in this case, the members are usually Consumers' Co-operatives...

 and occupied a large site, with entrances on King Street, Angel Street and Castle Street. The store, which also housed the headquarters of the Brightside and Carbrook, featured a massive granite

Granite

Granite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...

 facade with a zigzag canopy. Inside, the focus was on a cantilever

Cantilever

A cantilever is a beam anchored at only one end. The beam carries the load to the support where it is resisted by moment and shear stress. Cantilever construction allows for overhanging structures without external bracing. Cantilevers can also be constructed with trusses or slabs.This is in...

ed spiral staircase

Spiral staircase

Spiral staircase may refer to:* A type of stairway characterized by its spiral shape* The Spiral Staircase , a 1946 American psychological thriller film* The Spiral Staircase , a 1975 British film, a remake of the 1946 film...

 connecting all the floors, under a partially glazed dome and a sculpture of a bird.

Members

Eleanor Barton, a prominent co-operative movement activist, was for many years the secretary of the Brightside and Carbrook's Hillsborough

Hillsborough, South Yorkshire

Hillsborough is an electoral ward which includes the districts of Malin Bridge, Owlerton, Wadsley and Wisewood. It is one of the 28 electoral wards in City of Sheffield, England. It is located in the northwestern part of the city and covers an area of 4.6 km2...

 branch, and later became a director of the organisation. Other prominent members included Michael Palin

Michael Palin

Michael Edward Palin, CBE FRGS is an English comedian, actor, writer and television presenter best known for being one of the members of the comedy group Monty Python and for his travel documentaries....

, who joined the Brightside and Carbrook Co-operative Players in the 1960s.

Mergers

In the 1980s, the Brightside and Carbrook Co-op merged with the Sheffield and Ecclesall Co-operative to form the Sheffield Co-operative Society.

By 2006, the Society had 35 grocery shops, six travel stores, four petrol stations, seven funeral parlours and three department store

Department store

A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...

s. However, the group faced competition within Sheffield from both the United Co-operatives

United Co-operatives

United Co-operatives Limited, or simply United Co-op, was the largest regional consumer co-operative in the United Kingdom until its merger with The Co-operative Group in 2007. The Society operated across Yorkshire, the north west and north Midlands of England...

 and the Co-operative Group.

In 2007, the Society voted to merge with the United Co-operatives, which itself merged with the Co-operative Group shortly afterwards. All three of the former Society's department stores, including Castle House, were closed in 2008.