Uniform Swap – Editor’s Comments

We’re delighted to see Lincolnshire Sustainable Fashion Forum has organised a Uniform Swap Rail, which starts operating tomorrow.

Our experience with a similar project tells us that we may not need to wish the scheme success.

Back in 2019 we organised Lincoln’s first Uniform Exchange at The Drill – that’s me (right) and the Business Wife, Rachel, above with sample items.

We could not believe the response – it was fantastic and just a little overwhelming. 

The event had been organised just two weeks before we set up in The Drill’s café area and we’d left collection containers in locations such as Waitrose, the Waterside, St Marks and Playzone. 

In that short time, we’d had van loads of items donated – so much that we had hundreds of items piled up on tables, chairs and hanging from racks. There was a good steady attendance on the day, but most people brought items to exchange so we hardly scratched the surface of what had been donated.

The Exchange made a real difference to some lovely families on the day, who had some heart-warming and heart-breaking stories to tell.  There was also another side to the event – to make sure perfectly good uniforms were reused and didn’t end up in landfill. 

We achieved that aim through the charity Children’s Links, which had been planning to start a uniform recycling scheme across in its nurseries across Lincolnshire. Our event kick-started that scheme.

When we thought about it, we shouldn’t have been so surprised to get so much donated clothing. Most families will have outgrown uniforms in their homes and folk are incredibly generous with this sort of event – we had people going out to buy new kit to donate still in its packaging.

Of course, we hope the Forum’s swap rail at Lincoln Central Library is a huge success and if, as we suspect, it exceeds their expectations a charity has been chosen to receive the excess items. 

We were thrilled with the outcome of our event and were planning to keep up the momentum, but then the pandemic struck… so perhaps now’s the time to establish a more permanent exchange facility or facilities?

Rachel organising just some of the uniform pieces that had been donated at The Drill.