My journey in the world of charity retail began with volunteering for St Luke’s Hospice, Sheffield in their very first shop. It was 1983, I was 16 and I spent my Saturday mornings sorting clothes and learning about retail. Fast forward a few years and having got my Retail Marketing degree I decided commercial retail was not for me and volunteered at my local Oxfam shop. I learned so much there about people management, merchandising, customer service, how to be part of a team. That role set me off into a now 30 year career in the sector – and in that cyclical way life has sometimes, I’m now volunteering for Oxfam again – in rural Scotland this time, where I’ve just relocated.

I am loving it. I’ve met new friends and neighbours; learned where my bus goes from and to in order to get there (‘local’ in these parts equates to 20 miles away); been taught the till by another brilliant volunteer; been trusted to remerchandise the accessories department on my second week; been thanked by the Oxfam GB team via Twitter as well as by the lovely shop manager. I left my shift there this week with a big grin on my face, feeling good about myself and much more integrated into my new community.

All this has reminded me once again, how vital volunteers are for our sector – and how by giving them a great volunteering experience, they can be the best ambassadors for our charities AND feel fabulous about themselves too. It is easy as charity retail leaders for us to feel frustrated by not having enough volunteers, or worried about safeguarding, or caught up in the nitty gritty of our daily work – but by genuinely holding volunteers and the wonderful array of skills, stories and experience they bring to our organisations at the very centre of everything we do, we can harness amazing benefits.

Every volunteer journey begins before the potential volunteer identifies themselves to us. Everything we do needs to demonstrate how we value and support those who help us. Once the initial contact is made – either because we have proactively gone out and recruited, or the volunteer has taken the initiative unprompted by us – we need to ensure we give them the best experience possible, by listening, supporting, being clear with our expectations and abundant with our gratitude and praise. Every person who volunteers brings with them a lifetime of experiences – however long or short at that stage – and it is up to us as leaders to make the most of that amazing gift.

I believe my life is richer for having spent so much of it around volunteers – and about to be even richer for being one again. What a privilege it is for us to be part of this sector – let’s all remember how much the volunteers we know and those we are yet to meet make it that way, and make sure we give them the volunteering experience they desire and deserve.

The Charity Retail Consultancy can support you in ensuring your volunteers have the best journey possible. We offer training and support to charity retailers in volunteer recruitment, induction, development & reward. A recent charity retail volunteer recruitment and retention training day scored 93% from delegates’ feedback. Visit our website for more information or to get in touch email:

vicki@thecharityretailconsultancy.co.uk

jayne@thecharityretailconsultancy.co.uk

Future proofing your charity retail operation

I’ve been working with and talking to many charities with retail operations recently, and there’s quite a list of challenges they’re facing.  These include:

• Falling profits
• Rising costs
• A slump on the high street
• Customers’ falling disposable income
• Post-Brexit drop in confidence

But it’s not all doom and gloom – In 2025 brick-and-mortar stores are still projected to deliver 85% of UK sales.  But if you want to ensure that your charity is still generating a strong profit and profile from its high street presence, you must think differently.  If you can adapt to the changing environment, this can be a very exciting moment in retail history.  Here’s my 5 tips to stay ahead of the curve in charity retail:

1. Online development

There’s no denying that if you’re going to stay ahead of the pack, you need a strong digital presence.  A strong digital presence enhances the traditional shop experience, and vice versa.  Look at Cancer Research UK – all shops are encouraged to have a social media presence. And about half of Oxfam’s 620 stores sell clothes online.  As a result, these sales were up 33% at Christmas and it hopes to double its online sales to reach 5% of the business in just 3 years.

2.  In store experience

Even the online giant Amazon is opening bricks and mortar stores because they know that a unique store experience gives shoppers a compelling reason to engage with and revisit the brand.  John Lewis has a Customer Experience director and Waitrose is hosting yoga classes in some of its stores.  It’s essential that charity retailers design and use the sales areas for experiences as well as for displaying products.  Build stories not just stores!

Charities have some incredible brands and identities, so get these into your sales areas and bring the shopping experience to life.  Martin House Children’s Hospice has done this brilliantly by adding the artwork used in the hospice onto the shop walls.  Customers love the stronger association and will be increasingly buying into a brand as well as just purchasing a product.

3.  Personalisation and the Retail Revolution

Three-quarters of customers want personalized shopping experiences as a more personalised experience makes customers feel good and keeps them coming back.  Some commercial retailers use data-driven insights from customers’ purchases to deliver bespoke and unique customer experiences.  Click2Fit is an American online fashion retailer that uses thousands of rules developed by personal shoppers to select each customer’s perfect items.  After a few minutes creating a profile, the virtual personal shopper picks out clothing to fit and flatter you from styles that suit your lifestyle and budget.

The Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence are creating a Retail Revolution to support this further.  This might involve robots picking and packing to reduce customer costs, automated till points to speed up shopping (debatable!) or door counters that connect and predict footfall to your phone along with weather apps to decide the number of staff needed to give customers the best service.

4.  Environmental impact

Charity retailers reuse or recycle 95% of items donated to their shops, making the sector the greenest on the High Street. But this is not a well-known fact.  In recent weeks, the grocer Iceland captured media headlines by declaring it will be the first UK retailer to abolish plastic packaging, and Wagamama announced it is ditching plastic straws.  Charity retailers must seize the moment and start making the headlines – come on, who’s going to be the first to abolish plastic carrier bags?

5.  Community: Growing loyalty

Retailers know that they must nurture customer loyalty and inject heart and soul into their business.  Sonos studios in London is doing this by creating “a unique, acoustically tunable space where anyone can go to hear music as it should sound; where artists can experiment and share new ideas; a connecting point for a global network of musicians and makers.”  It’s not a shop and you can’t buy Sonos products.  It’s all about developing the brand’s relationship with its customers.   When I developed the youth-led charity retail brand Goodstock, we knew it needed a unique identity and had to directly appeal to its customer base, so we added events and experiences such as a popup nail bar, stylists, a DJ spot, youth markets and a yoga class –hey Waitrose, charity retail got there first!

I’ll quote you from every woman.com’s account of this year’s everywoman in Retail Awards: ‘The evening ended in a standing ovation for Woman of the Year Award winner Jayne Cartwright of Save the Children UK. As they heard Jayne’s story in more detail, the audience were moved to rise from their chairs and toast their glasses to a woman who has made a phenomenal impact on the charity retail sector, creating a whole new landscape for the industry.’ to read more click here.

Jayne Cartwright inspires audiences locally and nationally, here, Jayne was addressing the audience when she won ‘Woman of the Year Award’.

Jayne championed the opportunity to work with Mary Portas, and project managed Save the Children’s significant role in the “Mary, queen of charity shops” BBC television series.  She continued to work with Portas, then Grazia magazine, and headed up the biggest ever charity pop-up shop, raising £109,000 in three weeks.