Work with Us
Current Vacancies
Café and Front of House Manager
This is an exciting opportunity to join the team at Somerset Film in the recently re-developed Engine Room, a community media centre located in Bridgwater High Street. We are looking for a friendly, energetic person with a passion for great coffee and tasty vegetarian and vegan food to help develop our café and building facility hire. You will provide a welcoming, safe environment for our regular users and visitors.
General Role Details:
Hours: 35 hours per week Monday to Friday - typically 9.30am - 4.30pm with occasional Saturdays in discussion with the post holder
Wages: £11.94 an hour - permanent role
The post-holder will be based at the Engine Room premises, High Street, Bridgwater, Somerset TA6 3BL.
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To oversee and run the café in particular providing a vegetarian and vegan menu and great coffee
To be the initial contact for all visitors to Somerset Film and the Engine Room between the designated hours.
To lead on the promotion and hiring out of rooms, including the use of social media accounts
To lead on health and safety in the cafe and the day to day cleaning and maintenance of the building
To manage associated cafe initiatives such as the Repair Café
To provide administrative support to other members of staff
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We are looking for someone with:
Good cooking skills with a knowledge of vegetarian and vegan food
A passion for hospitality and great ideas for developing our offer
Commercial awareness and understanding of budgets and profitability
Ability to manage stock and adherence to health and safety regulations
Adaptability. You’ll enjoy a changing environment with a wide variety of activities taking place
The following skills are seen as essential for the job. You will need to provide evidence of your involvement and level of skill in the following areas.
Essential Skills
Knowledge and experience of cooking and catering
Knowledge and experience of health and hygiene legislation. Qualified to Level 2 Food Hygiene
Knowledge of budgets and profitability
Working knowledge of COSSH
Good financial and administration skills, able to work efficiently with good attention to detail
Able to work alone and to manage a small team
Good communicator
Basic IT Skills
Desirable Skills
Experience working with volunteers
Knowledge and use of social media
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Applications in writing (covering letter, CV including links to your website or portfolio and state that you have completed
equal opportunities monitoring form
to Chair of Trustees via info@somersetfilm.com by using “Café Manager” in the subject line.We encourage applications from disabled and BME applicants who are underrepresented in our organisation.
Somerset Film will only interview applicants with the relevant experience.
The successful applicant will require a satisfactory enhanced DBS check.
Volunteering Opportunities
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'A Village Apart, Villages Together', the C S John Sparkes Archive Project will take a year to complete (January - December 2024). Volunteers can help catalogue and digitise the films (300+ 8mm films), during sessions which will be held in Burtle and at the Engine Room in Bridgwater.
Please complete this form if you want to get involved.
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We are looking for people willing to bring energy, enthusiasm and commitment to the role, and who will broaden the diversity of thinking on our board.
ROLE
0 - 2 hours per week on average.
6 board meetings a year + 1 awayday.
Somerset Film at The Engine Room, Bridgwater TA6 3BL
SUMMARY
Somerset Film is looking for volunteers to join our board of trustees and to help in our continued development. We invite people from any background living in or close to Somerset, to join our board of trustees. You don’t need previous experience of media or the charity sector, but you do need to share our mission to provide training, support and opportunities to all of Somerset’s many communities.
Our trustees currently meet once every two months to discuss the charity’s performance with the management team and to check progress and policies. Meetings are held in Bridgwater and online. Trustees also provide support for the management team and staff on an ad hoc basis outside of these formal meetings.
If you are a young person or have a disability and are interested in what we do, but don’t feel ready to join the board, we would welcome you as a member of either our youth or disability advisory panels.
We invite people from any background living in or close to Somerset, to join our board of trustees. You don’t need previous experience of media or the charity sector, but you do need to share our mission to provide training, support and opportunities to all of Somerset’s many communities.
Currently there are 8 trustees who represent the following perspectives:
White British; male; female
Age 25 -75
South Somerset; Taunton & West Somerset; Mendip; Bristol;
Media production; digital art; music; community regeneration; local authority; NGOs
It is important that our trustees reflect Somerset’s diversity, so if you are not represented here but feel you can contribute to our mission, please get in touch.
We are keen to add people with a background in finance or law to strengthen the board’s existing skills.
We also wish to strengthen what we already have so if you’re worried you might be duplicating any of our existing trustees, don’t be put off.
CONTACT
Andrew Buchanan, Chair. andrewb@somersetfilm.com
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We are looking for a volunteer who would like to join us as front of house for our Repair Cafe. You will meet and greet customers, and help them to complete the repair forms.
The Repair Cafe is the last Saturday of the month, 11am-2pm. We would need your support during these time (three hours per month).
For more info contact Ania, call 01278 433 187 or email
Freelance Work
Are you an Artist, Filmmaker or Digital Artist? We regularly employ freelancers for our production, community outreach and courses.
If you are interested in freelance opportunities with us, please send us your CV and a showreel/examples of work to our Producer.
Work Experience
Each year we offer a one-week placement for school pupils studying GCSE (subject to our capacity). Our next work experience week will take place from Monday 16 - Friday 20 June 2025, to apply complete our application form, which you can find below.
What we’re looking for is bright, highly motivated people who have a clear interest in media, and are driven to succeed. We encourage applications from those under-represented in the industry, including women, disabled, LGBTQI+, socio-economically disadvantaged, neurodivergent and those form the global majority. If we are over-subscribed, which we often are, we will prioritise places accordingly. We give priority to students currently studying at HE (Higher Education) level for placements of up to three weeks.
If you’re between 16 and 19, we encourage you to apply for BFI Film Academy first before applying for work experience.
If you meet our criteria, and there are places available, we’ll contact you. Not everyone will get a place, and we may not be able to offer your preferred dates.
We try our best to respond to every email, however during busy periods please be patient with us. We will get back to you as soon as possible.
Think carefully about your answers to the questions on the work experience application form (submission details are on the form) – they are what we’ll use to decide who gets a placement! Please note this form is only for students in eductions.
If you aren’t in education, you can still volunteer with us, email us to find out what opportunities we have.
