Powering Onside to empower the youth
OnSide is built around a clear and powerful purpose: to empower young people to lead positive, fulfilling lives by giving them access to safe, inspiring spaces and exceptional youth work. Operating 18, soon to be 22 vibrant Youth Zones across the UK and expanding rapidly, they combine world-class facilities like sports halls, music rooms, and gyms with high-quality support from trained, dedicated youth workers. This creates places where young people feel they belong, are supported to grow, and are inspired to build brighter futures.
The Tension: The Weight of Every Penny in a Transactional Industry
In the charity sector, energy cost isn't just a simple line in a budget; it is a direct lever on how much positive impact the organisation can deliver.
As Andrew Taylor, Network Facilities Manager from OnSide, explains, the pressure is incredibly high and unrelenting because every single pound matters. Every pound spent on an inefficient contract, or an unexpected cost, is a pound taken directly away from front-line youth work.
For a charity operating multiple high-energy, multi-site spaces, energy management is absolutely central to keeping the doors open and operating at the high standard young people deserve. It is a core enabler of their entire mission.
Dealing with the traditional energy market often adds severe friction to this mission. The industry is frequently plagued by a lack of transparency, complex tariffs, and hidden fees. Andrew notes that past experiences with standard suppliers involved high-pressure sales brokers who frequently called with low initial price estimates but failed to deliver on them. This constant firefighting, combined with a lack of guidance on how to actually keep prices down, created unnecessary administrative stress for a team that needed to focus on young people.
The Connection: A Human Partnership Built on Trust
To combat these challenges, OnSide has worked with Unify Energy for almost a decade. While managing a charity's budget means carefully exploring the wider market for specific sites to find the best value, OnSide consistently relies on Unify as its trusted core partner.
The differentiator is completely human. Instead of automated bots or long call-centre queues where customers are left on hold, OnSide has a direct line to their dedicated Account Manager, Lauren Yates. Andrew notes that having direct access to someone who completely knows their history and site setup builds deep trust, saves time, and reduces risk. Lauren provides genuine, honest advice and works closely with the pricing team to ensure they always get the best options available without the fear of being ripped off.
The Action: Acting as a Second Pair of Eyes
Unify’s role goes far beyond simply supplying energy; they act as a consultative extension of OnSide’s team. A key part of the relationship involves checking and verifying quotes that OnSide receives from other suppliers across the market. Unify helps translate technical details and calls out hidden charges or red flags in competing proposals, serving as a trusted advisor rather than just a utility vendor.
This collaborative approach is particularly vital as OnSide continues to scale. When developing new Youth Zones, Unify manages new site connections and handles technical configurations to ensure that the transition from a construction site to a community hub is perfectly smooth. This ensures that when a new zone opens, it is fully powered, operational, and ready to serve the community from day one.
The Outcome: Headspace to Focus on Impact
By stripping away the complexity of utility management, Unify’s transparent pricing model has turned energy from a source of uncertainty into a stable foundation for long-term planning. It gives OnSide clarity, control, and absolute budgeting confidence.
Ultimately, the biggest benefit of the partnership is the return of time and mental capacity. The tremendous amount of stress saved allows OnSide's team to shift their focus away from managing utility complexities and put all of their energy back into changing young people's lives.
"It turns the relationship into one of a trusted adviser rather than a supplier, helping us navigate complexity, avoid risk, and stay focused on delivering impact where it matters most."
