Hello all As the director of Clothes for Causes I want to apologise firstly for not responding sooner. Feedback is very important to us as is the general public knowing what we are trying to achieve. I hope I can answer some very important points here. There are lessons to be learnt from our perspective and believing in total transparency I will start from the beginning. I have personally invested a large sum of an inheritance into a new venture I have extensive experience with but most importantly am hugely passionate about. Clothes for causes was born from frustration, collectively myself and the board of trustees also with current experience within the charity sector have a vision and mission to pioneer something we think is special, unique and not being done within the charity sector currently. We currently have three shops with plans for further openings this year, each of our shops are and will be registered in their own entities as ltd within companies house in order to safeguard Clothes for Causes. This is normal practise. We as a 100% non profit charity are also 100% volunteer led from directorship to the volunteers running shops. We are in the process of applying for charity registration with the Charity Commission, once this process is completed as there are many factors involved we shall as any charity be able to display the number. I am very proud of our team for what we have achieved in such a short time 3 shops in as many months, each shop within a budget of 5k using local trades and materials. Our experience has enabled us to call on many links equally excited about our plans that have supported us with some incredible donations to start this venture, more importantly the support from the local communities in which we trade has been enormously positive and generous and well received. What we are trying to achieve is ambitious and not easy, we want to be innovative and raise as much funds to support our local communities which we believe are forgotten. We want and are collaborating with the local authorities in the boroughs in which we reside to identify local causes wether they be charity based or individual that really need our help with no other means of support as long as they fall in line with our articles and directives to help with the relief of poverty and welfare. The funds we distribute after operating costs must not be for governance, admin but have real tangible results. We believe working in partnership with the local authority's is a more professional and authentic way to distribute funds. We also want to build a network of skilled trades wanting to donate a little time to offer their services in a voluntary capacity to our local communities which is the heart of what we aim to achieve. As a 100% non profit charity not business, we are totally reliant on donated clothing, we do not buy clothing. We do however buy in some new goods not clothing this is no different to the major high street charities who buy in new goods to sell. It is part of an offer we believe is part of our niche of not your average charity shopping experience and in line with the charity commission regulations. We sell these goods at a much lower mark up than others. As part of our community vision we have a discount shop in Eltham which means we don't recycle clothing to the rag trade but further support our community by selling through in this format. Our website is under construction and we are working to get this ready very soon where there will be a wealth of information and links to partnerships. Volunteers and donations are the life blood of our charity, we know there are training issues, each volunteer is inducted fully but obviously we have work to do. Trying to explain our vision is complicated as someone mentioned earlier it would be easy to pluck a popular cause and back but that is not what we are trying to do. I am very encouraged and humbled by the enthusiasm from the general public that want to get on board and have offered their services, even a local lawyer in East Dulwich has expressed an interest to join the board which is just fantastic and I look forward to this coming to fruition. There are of course many things for us still to do, wether it be finishing details within the shops to printing materials detailing our vision and further information. I welcome any feedback as we are constantly learning, as we grow we hope to get it right, our foremost thoughts are to raise as much money as we can to be the change we want to see. I am available most days at the East Dulwich branch and can be contacted on 07447014694 at any time to answer any questions. Kind regards. Veronique
