The Isle of Wight has been selected as the first place in the UK to trial/test a brand new service that will eventually be rolled-out across the rest of the UK.
Charity Street: An in-depth chat
OnTheWight spent half an hour on the phone with Joe Metcalfe – the man behind the Charity Street idea – really getting into the guts of how the application runs, why the Isle of Wight is great place to run technology trails.
What is Charity Street?
Many people love browsing through charity shops, digging through what’s available on the shelves to find amazing ‘diamonds in the rough.’
Well, the Charity Street App hopes that it’s all going to get a lot easier, where you’ll be able to browse through items from the comfort of your sofa, reserving your ‘diamonds’.
Starting at 6pm
Tonight (Monday) at 6pm Charity Street will open its virtual doors for the first time.
Islanders will have a chance try and bag items that managers of selected Island charity shops have especially selected. Picking interesting items that they have in-store will be available on mobile and online.
How it works
- Sign up for the service in advance
- Pre-selected items become available at 6pm, until 9am the next morning
- Have a look at the items – the ones nearest to you will be seen first
- The first person to reserve the item, wins it
- The item then has to be paid for and picked up from the charity shop. Click and Collect they call it.
- The next evening, a fresh set of items become available again at 6pm and the fun starts again.
Why this is interesting
We at OnTheWight think this is an interesting idea for a number of reasons – In the world of the Internet where everything is plentiful and available 24 hours a day, to have things that are restricted – the focused selection of goods, available for a limited period of time.
While you’re doing it, you’re also helping out the good cause – the charity behind the shops.
Of course, the quality of the items made available will be the difference between if the service flies or not – so the managers of the shops will be under pressure to not only have the best items available, but to encourage the best donations into their shops too.
Once it’s been proven on the Isle of Wight, that learning will be taken and used before it’s used across the rest of the UK.
Shops involved
List of shops involved at the start of the trial:
Earl Mountbatten Hospice
- 22-24 Lugley Street, Newport
- Donation & Distribution Centre, 16a Riverside, Newport
- Cowes Shop, 115 High Street, Cowes
- The Corner Shop, Avenue Road, Freshwater
Age UK
- 169 High Street, Ryde
- 32 York Avenue, East Cowes
- 114A Pyle Street, Newport
- 3 High Street, Shanklin
The British Heart Foundation
- 2 Taylor Road, Gunville Estate, Newport
