Commonwealth Games: How a Big Issue vendor is moving hearts and minds

Budding Commonwealth Games runner and ex-vendor Joel Hodgson is having an impact upon the futures of more Big Issue sellers…

The success of Joel Hodgson –  the former Big Issue seller turned Commonwealth Games hopeful and star of this week’s Big Issue cover – has helped open up opportunities for other vendors, it has been claimed.

Stephen Robertson, chief executive of The Big Issue Foundation, the charity arm of The Big Issue, has watched Joel transform himself into a glowing success from the first day he turned to The Big Issue after becoming homeless in 2009.

Hodgson, who was born in Belize and adopted by a Scottish family as a young child, was sleeping rough with his girlfriend in Westminster when he started selling The Big Issue to try and pull together some money. He saved enough to pitch up in a campsite before securing a small flat in east London.

He put himself forward to front a placement scheme between The Big Issue and one of London’s biggest law firms, Freshfields, to sell the magazine at the organisation’s Fleet Street HQ, before eventually landing a full-time job in the firm’s billing department.

“When I first met Joel he was fairly new to The Big Issue and was, as he said, ‘camping’ in east London,” Stephen explained. “He became the first vendor to participate in The Big Issue Foundation’s vendor placement scheme.

“When he first stepped through the door at Freshfields he began a journey that would change hearts and minds forever.

“Selling magazines within a leading City law firm is no small challenge. Joel received training and support from the team there and went on to gain a job in the open market and so much more. He has gone on to open opportunities for other vendors in firms across the city.

“Joel has become one of our most powerful ambassadors, speaking about the support he has received from the Big Issue Foundation and how the Big Issue helped him to change his life. I am proud to have shared many a platform with him. And witness him change minds for good.”

His journey from sleeping rough in central London to forging a career in The City is now set to take another incredible twist, with talented runner Joel now gunning to qualify to represent his home country Belize at this summer’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

You can read more about Joel’s remarkable story in this week’s Big Issue, on sale now.