Residents of a north Cumbria community shop have expressed their delight at reaching their target in their quest to save the store.

The Management Committee for Kirkoswald Community Shop launched the scheme earlier this year, with shares costing £25 each, after the store was put up for sale.

Ravenbridge Stores was put up for sale following the death of its former owner, the local philanthropist David Hodgkiss. Mr Hodgkiss saved the store over ten years ago when he purchased the site back in 2009.

Kirkoswald residents were celebrating this week after learning that a challenging fundraising target had been reached and surpassed.

Ruth Anderson MBE, chair of the Management Committee, stated her gratitude for the support.

She said: "We were blown away with the level of the support we have had both locally, from across the country and internationally as far afield as New Zealand, the USA and France.

"I had a lot of faith in how community minded people were here locally. Talking to people, I knew how much people valued it and so I had a gut feeling that we would get to the target that we set.

"It's a very community minded village and I know that people want to keep all of our services here and sustainable."

Ruth confirmed that plans are afoot for reopening in due course.

"We want to move forward as quickly as possible. We hope to be open in early July. We've exchanged contracts for purchase. We don't want to waste any time and would like to be open as soon as possible."