We know that there are many other wonderful organizations helping clothe family and children in need besides Pass It On, Baby! but it's hard to always know who's out there. Until somehow, someone searching to help others miraculously comes across your similar organization. That was the case with a special woman named Meg that contacted us recently about her non-profit called peace. love. swap. She wanted to donate any leftover clothing items from her swaps to our organization to help those in need.
Peace. Love. Swap. is a large-scale local community swap for maternity, baby, kid, teen and gear! Their mission is to keep gently used baby, kids, and maternity items out of the landfills and to donate to local charities by producing fun, affordable, family-friendly, swaps on a regular basis. Here is a recent blog written by Meg about her organization.
You can barely open up a magazine or read a blog today without finding something about “clothing swaps”, “swap parties” or swap websites. Although clothing swaps have been around awhile, they are becoming increasingly popular due to the “green” movement and a lagging economy. The idea is the same in most cases – get together (in person or online) and exchange your unwanted stuff for stuff that is “new” to you. It’s green, because you are reusing instead of buying new, it’s easy on your pocketbook because nothing is for sale – only trade, and a lot of times it’s helping others out because leftovers go to charities.
I have 3 kids (15, 5 & 2) and one on the way. I know how expensive it can be to buy new things for my kids all the time. I also know how much waste it creates – between the shipping, packaging & getting rid of the old stuff. I had always tried to shop consignment and sometimes at thrift stores, but after awhile, I realized I was taking in a lot of stuff and barely getting any credit to spend other “new” things. Many times, consignment stores or sales won’t even take certain things, so I ended up taking my stuff to places like Goodwill or Salvation Army to donate. I have also done the swap, sell, trade thing online. I just really didn’t have time to take pictures of all my things, post & go through all the emails, and wait for someone to show up. I had been to a clothing swap before, and felt like it was a concept that needed to be tweaked to accommodate moms and dads that constantly have kid stuff to get rid of. So, I created peace. love. swap. It’s the only organization that produces and supports Kid’s Clothing and Gear swaps on a regular basis. They aren’t small “swap parties” where you invite some of your friends and exchange stuff – these are large scale – 50-100 moms and dads that get together regularly at family friendly venues like gymnastics centers and indoor play places, and bring in all their unwanted baby, kid & maternity items (clothes and gear), and then take whatever they want. Families can bring in as much or as little as they want – and take what they need. We only ask that they bring it back for someone else when their kids are done with the stuff.
Right now we do the swaps in 10 cities in California, and have more starting up all the time. We have 2 out-of-state ones coming in late spring/early summer. We are dedicated to helping moms and dads all over the country get one started in their own community. We truly believe these events are beneficial to everyone involved. peace. love. swap kid’s clothing & gear swaps are eco-friendly, recession friendly, and since all of our leftovers go to charity- we are very community friendly too. If you would like more information about peace. love. swap, please go to our website www.peaceloveswap.com or email peaceloveswap@gmail.com .What a fabulous in-expensive way to help out your local community and get the items you need for your family as well. What's so great about this swap is that whatever is left gets donated through organizations like PIOB to continue helping as many families as possible.
If you would like to start a PIOB/PLS swap in your area, let us know. Here is some additional information on how the swap works. Here is how to get started. Who knows how this could grow. A joint PIOB/PLS swap could not only help your family and community but the leftovers you have could be sent through Pass It On, Baby! to a wonderful family in need. Maybe there's even a small donation of $1-$2 for each person that attends to help pay for the shipping these boxes of items to the families in need. Let us know if your interested. In the meantime, we LOVE the idea of the "pls" event and hope you too will pass along this to those you know.
Happy swapping, sharing and donating!
In love and kindness,
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