As a by-product of the drive to make more and more of the UK’s waste recyclable, local scrapstores exist in a huge number of UK locations. Often setup by volunteers to raise funds to support specific charities, they also provide a vital service to businesses by accepting their surplus or redundant stock. This benefits the company by helping them avoid costly disposal fees, and benefits the community who have access to affordable materials for many different projects.
Many UK scrapstores focus on materials that children find useful in a variety of artistic, play or creative purposes. Broadly known as kid’s arts & crafts, this can encompass so many different materials from paper, pens and crayons, to paints, cardboard tubes, plastic sheets and foam building blocks. Adults benefit too, with end of lines like buttons, curtain or dressmaking materials, cotton reels and knitting wool skeins. Some of these scrapstores even sell building materials like blocks, bricks, timber, screws, nails and discontinued paint colours.
Most scrapstores in the UK are run by an ever willing band of volunteers. These dedicated people not only passionately want to support their chosen charity, but also fervently believe in the process of reusing as much of the countries waste as possible. If items can be saved from entering landfill sites or ending up being incinerated, this can benefit the planet and its fragile climate as well. Communities are urged to support their regional scrapstore who in turn are supported by registered charity ScrapstoresUK. Not only will purchases save consumers a lot of money, they are also supporting a number of very worthwhile causes.
