Phil Spencer supports Sustainable Sales

Host a Sustainable Sale for SOS Children

"Here is a fantastic opportunity to de-clutter, free up some space and at the same time help abandoned and orphaned children around the world..."

Phil Spencer, SOS Children Ambassador

Instead of throwing away your old, unused or unwanted items why not host your own Sustainable Sale and raise money for SOS Children?  You could even try selling your items on eBay to raise money for vulnerable children. The money you raise will directly help communities around the world that need it most.

How to throw your Sustainable Sale

• Decide on a date and location for your sale – it could be your garage, garden, local school, church, workplace or community centre.
• Have a spring-clean and ask your friends, family and colleagues to donate their unwanted items to your charity sale.  Tell them all the money collected from the sale of the items will help vulnerable children and fragile families.
• Promote your sustainable sale; put up posters in your local area, advertise your event on Facebook and Twitter, and send out an email to encourage people to come along.
• Enjoy your day selling your items to help make a difference to SOS Children.
• Send your donations in to SOS Children online or by post.

Why support SOS Children?

In times of crisis, we all need someone to turn to. However much families try to support each other, when they’re weakened by chronic poverty, they can be quickly overwhelmed by disease, conflict or natural disasters.

SOS Children is a global authority on nurturing and supporting families. We provide direct care for orphaned and abandoned children, and we work with local communities to keep fragmenting families together.

We ensure our care provides lasting change for children; this creates positive futures for generations to come leading to more sustainable communities and countries. We need your help to keep our crucial work going.

Phil Spencer

Phil Spencer tells us why he is supporting the Sustainable Sale initiative:

“I like to believe that travelling around the country filming property programmes and looking around houses for a living gives me a decent insight into how people use their homes. Not only do we have high property prices in the UK, the actual costs of moving home (agents fees / stamp duty etc) are also very high - which means lots and lots of families are living in homes they have effectively grown out of. Space is at such a premium today.

As we go through life we tend to gather more and more possessions and our homes are becoming increasingly jam packed with stuff! You probably don't notice it as it happens gradually, but it can be a cathartic experience to take a look around and see if you really do need things that are taking up such precious space!”

Why can’t you send your unwanted items directly to our Villages?

We believe in being a sustainable charity which means that we need to support the local economy and labour markets in which we work. Therefore we buy all our items for our Villages from the local area, helping support the wider communities around our Villages. This is also keeps us green – reducing the carbon emissions from transporting goods thousands of miles.

We don't have any SOS Children's Villages in the UK therefore the postage and administrative costs involved in sending parcels overseas is high. Even when the postage costs are generously paid by the sender, the receiver will often have to pay customs charges at the other end and such charges are not built into our local budgets. Also unfortunately in some countries, parcels would not even reach the destination, as the goods would be intercepted along the way and taken by individuals for their own use.

For these reasons we therefore can’t send your items directly to our Villages and instead we’re asking you to hold a Sustainable Sale and we will send your generous donations to communities that need them most.

Paying in your ‘Sustainable Sale’ donation to SOS Children

Online

You can donate online. In the special instructions box just let us know that you’ve held a ‘Sustainable Sale’ on our behalf.

Make a sustainable sale donation

On eBay

Through the sales of your unwanted items on eBay not only will you be making a difference to SOS Children but you’ll also benefit from your listing standing out in the crowd. All you need to do when listing is choose SOS Children as your charity, followed by the percentage of the sale price you wish to donate - and eBay will do the rest. After your items sell the donation will automatically be paid into our bank account.

Over the phone

Call our office on 01223 365589 to make your donation over the phone by credit or debit card.

By post

You can send a cheque or postal order to the following address. All cheques should be made payable to ‘SOS Children’.

SOS Children, Terrington House, 13-15 Hills Road, Cambridge, CB2 1NL