Thank you Crediton for your Magnificent Support
The Sustainable Crediton Waste Action Group would like to send
our sincere thanks to all the people of the Crediton area who
supported our recent Give and Take Pop Up Shop on Crediton High
Street so magnificently. The event was an astounding success and
exceeded all our expectations. We had anticipated a dribble of
people and goods through the doors but in actual fact we
experienced a flood! We appeared on TV on BBC Spotlight and
BBC Radio Devon's Breakfast Show. Justin Leigh even wore a pair of
slippers Jenny Waldron took from the shop!
During the 14 days we were open over 7,700 people walked through
our doors. This was truly amazing for a town the size of Crediton.
We even had visitors from as far afield as Tiverton, Exeter
Barnstaple and Taunton! Some people came back every day to bring
more goods to donate or to see what new surprises had appeared. All
in all over 7,000 kg of goods came through the door, every bit
freely given, and over 95% of it found good new homes.
A huge range of items were donated including thousands of books,
CD's, DVD's children's toys and clothes, but also some more unusual
items. Some that stick in our memory are an architect's bench, a
kitchen sink and an individually made metal sculpture. There were
also some really lovely stories about the new homes where goods
were going. Our mayor, Frank Letch, took a large sculpture of 3
owls for his 95 year old mother, who loves owls. A set of giant
dominos went to a local care home where the residents have trouble
seeing the dots on regular sized ones. A delighted child minder
took away a childrens tandem tricycle for her little charges to
play on and many practically new items, dug out from the backs of
people's cupboards where they had sat forlorn and forgotten, went
home with adults and children alike with beams on their
faces.
Our thanks also go to the Devon County Council Locality Fund and
the Big Lottery Fund for the grants which paid the premises
overheads and advertising and all the groups and businesses in the
town who supported us. Also we must not forget to the small army of
volunteers who manned the shop so tirelessly for the 14 days.
Events like this really show what a great and generous community
Crediton is to live and work in and how fortunate we are to have a
wonderful community newspaper like the Courier which gave us
such invaluable editorial coverage. The highest number of shoppers
through our door was in fact on the two days after the Courier
featured us on their front page!
So to conclude, we have been asked many times whether we will be
doing it again! At this moment in time we are taking a breather,
but we do have some ideas about where we can go from here, so watch
this space. If you would like more information about our group and
what we do, or to get involved in a future event like this, we
would love to have you. Please visit our website www.sustainablecrediton.org.uk
Our Give and Take Pop Up Shop advice
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Sustainable Crediton Waste Action Group.