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The Blue Cabin core team meet approximately three times a year for away days, usually at the Peace Gardens at Minsteracres Retreat Centre in County Durham.
As part of our summer 2024 meeting, our Environment Working Group came up with the idea of a swap shop to support our environment and sustainability work. We invited the team to bring up to five items that they no longer wanted, needed or used, to swap with things other members of the team had to offer. The idea of things being reused and recycled appeals to the team, and this was the perfect opportunity to stop things going to landfill. Our inaugural swap shop was born!
Items people brought ranged from clothes and toys, to stationery and crockery. On the day we displayed the treasures for everyone to peruse and built in time for the swapping to take place.
Everyone was initially asked to select up to five items to take home, though in reality people ended up with much more! Anything that was left was either taken home again, or donated to a charity shop.
Everyone agreed this was a great addition to our away days, so we will plan to do this annually going forward. Feedback from the team included:
I loved the simplicity of it. It didn’t take huge amounts of planning and there were no rules on what you could bring. It was just nice to know that things might get another life.
I loved bringing things that I knew would then be treasured and loved again.
It’s a lovely light-hearted addition to a team day, providing an opportunity for everyone to chat and tell stories about their items over lunch.
Lovely to have a clear out and lovely to shop things that others were donating.
Opening it up to a general swap shop, rather than just clothing only was perfect!
I smile every time I hang my new tea towel on the washing line.
Amy Armstrong is part of our Environment and Working Group.
Find out more about our approach to sustainability here.
