We all know how there’s a great desire for a bargain on the Island (we _love_ a bargain), but beyond getting paid to take something away, you’re not going to find a cheaper price than free.
To indulge your passion for a bargain, there’s no better place to look than on FreeCycle. It’s an email-based mailing list that has groups all over the world – amazingly it’s now got over 4,000. In the UK alone there’s 412 covering over 600,000 members.
You won’t be surprised to hear that it’s all about people who have thing that they don’t want any more, putting up a posting describing it, and letting people know about it.
Once you’ve given a couple of things away, you’ll also be able to place Wanted postings, to tip the people who might have your desired object knocking around doing nothing into action.
There’s a Freecycle list based on the Island which is getting increasingly busy.
Some of the things go amazingly fast. I saw a scaffold pole last week (not something I would have though there would have been a huge demand for), and within 30 mins of the posting it had been vouched for already!
(BTW I’m still looking for a 10-12 foot scaffold pole to mount a weather station so we can add weather reporting to VentnorBlog, so please get in touch if you know of one.)
So with Spring here, there’s a perfect opportunity to clear out those things that have been cluttering up your cupboard – and have a lovely glow about yourself, knowing that you’ve helped someone out.
Spread the news as far as you can on this. I’ve been to tip and been amazed/dismayed as to what people are throwing away – particularly seemingly perfectly fine electrical equipment. It can only be good to have this stuff passed on to someone who needs it, rather than filling the ground with a load of broken plastic and electronic circuit boards.
