Over 5,000 branded items donated to tireless UK-wide homelessness charity Crisis in unprecedentedly generous donation

In mid-February Arcadia Corporate Merchandise Ltd reached out to the A Good Thing team with a pretty amazing proposal: they told us they had some old client stock in a warehouse in west London that was no longer required, and were looking to donate the whole lot to one charitable cause. Arcadia explained that there were eight pallets of items available, weighing in at just over 1,200 kg.

A massive range of items on offer

There was a huge range of different types of items, including adult clothing (caps, warm puffer jackets, T shirts, fleeces, Nike polo shirts) and babygrows, plus drinkware items including tumblers, mugs and drinking bottles. There were also foldable laptop stands, Moleskine notebooks and stylus pens, as well as nearly 30 backpacks.

Jason Markwick, Arcadia Company Director, explains how the firm had ended up with these items to rehome:

“Arcadia is a branded merchandise company working with brands all over the globe. Although we try to avoid it, occasionally companies we work with rebrand – and the existing stock isn’t useful to them any longer, or a client simply moves on, and has no requirement for the surplus stock we’re warehousing. In this instance, a client based in another region no longer required our services and did not want to collect their remaining stock.”

Finding a new home 

The A Good Thing team set about reaching out a number of different homelessness charities that were signed up with the platform, and very quickly the items found a home with the homelessness charity Crisis. Richard Davies, Warehouse and Facilities Manager at Crisis, immediately arranged for two drivers to travel to the west London warehouse to make the collection on the designated day. Richard explained how donations like this one are used:

“These sorts of donations always go to the people experiencing homelessness. The individuals whom we help. No middleman is used, we hand items directly to those said individuals.”

Committed to sustainability

The team at Arcadia told us they were delighted with this outcome, and felt the A Good Thing platform was the ideal solution:

“As an industry, the merchandise sector has in the past been wasteful, with unused items ending up in landfill. Due to Arcadia’s ongoing commitment to better company sustainability, we always try to find a way for items to find a use, be repurposed or recycled. Donating via A Good Thing was a brilliant way to achieve this without any added labour or stress for our company.”

Richard Davies at Crisis explained that the items donated would be part of the ‘Crisis at Christmas 2024’ project, which the charity typically has to begin preparing for many months in advance:

“We are in the process of sourcing all items needed for such a large event: without kind donors we just could not facilitate it. Thank you to your team and to the amazing people who use your service. We cannot thank you enough for this donation and the hard work that has taken place for it to happen.”

Support that really lasts

‘Crisis at Christmas’ is a huge part of the charity’s operations, and requires a massive amount of support: last year the project provided health and wellbeing services, hotel accommodation and hot food to over 6,600 people across the UK. Often, someone’s engagement with Crisis at Christmas is actually the start of specialist support that lasts all year round: from mental health and wellbeing sessions, to help with housing, employment and skills training. People are given the support they need to leave homelessness behind, and find a safe and secure home.

The whole Arcadia team were very positive about the experience of having used A Good Thing to rehome the items:

“I must say we were surprised at how easy it was to organise, as it was a very large amount of items; I think there were almost 5,000 individual products in total. What was so great was that A Good Thing not only found the right charity to receive the goods – they organised the collection and the distribution too. It meant we could rest easy, knowing that items that we’ve branded have found a purpose.”

It's time to make a difference

We asked Arcadia to tell us a bit about the promotional products industry more broadly – we were interested to find out whether it typically has things to rehome on a large scale like this:

“There are definitely companies within our industry who will find themselves in situations where they are holding excess stock, incorrect prints, or samples which they no longer have a need for. However, the promotional merchandise sector is going through a very large change to a more sustainable future and because of that, I’m sure that many merchandise companies would benefit from using an organisation like A Good Thing. It’s important to find a way for these items to be gifted to a charity where they will make a difference, and given to those who can make good use of them.”

If you are a charity looking for items: sign up now!

Has this article inspired you to partner with A Good Thing and reach charities in your local community? Yes, register now!