TRAID X FRA Pop Up Shop

The Fashion Retail Academy and TRAID have teamed up to create a pop up store and promote second hand clothing. Here is what we got up to:

TRAID’S Main Objectives:

They are working towards recycling and reusing garments, protecting the environment, reducing world poverty by raising funds for international development projects and to educate the public.
They want to reduce the amount of clothing which is thrown away and wasted.
They turn the clothing into funds and resources to reduce environmental and social impacts. This reduces waste, carbon, emissions and consumption. T
The profits help fund international development projects to improve conditions and working practices in the textile industry. This also educates people of all ages about the environment, peoples lives and how we can make more sustainable choices.
They have over 1,500 charity clothes banks, home collections and charity shops diverting around 3,000 tones of clothes from landfill and incineration every year.
Spread the word on social media #secondhandfirst and #wearingtraid

TRAID Warehouse Experience:

At TRAID warehouse we had to organise the clothing donations to categorise them into Premium, High Street, Basic, Accessories and Reject. We had to analyse the clothing making sure that the quality was high and suitable for people to buy. After we had a tour of the factory and watched everyone sort out the clothing by assessing the quality and sending to the right stores. They also had bags ready for wholesale which were not suitable for TRAID, so they were to be sent to other countries to be sold. There was also another area of filled bags which were to be sent for recycling as they were worn out clothing.

TRAID Photoshoot:

Here are some images of our photoshoot at the TRAID factory.

TRAID X FRA Advert:

Here is my advert I made for our pop up, this was played around the store.

The research we conducted was to look at the TRAID YouTube channel to see what their videos were like. We studied the layout and important information they have included in their videos. We wanted the advert to reflect the brands message and to show what TRAID do, we included clips from the TRAID factory visit and added text of the key facts about the charity. We got the facts from TRAIDs website in the about category and also from our notes from when TRAID visited FRA.

This video is suitable to our demographic because it includes a video of young people collecting clothes and organising them to give to TRAID charity. There are also images at the end from the TRAID photoshoot which shows a young girl wearing second hand clothing with the hashtag #secondhandfirst.

I have learnt that fashion sustainability is very important as our decisions impact the environment and social aspects within fashion. TRAID’s charity funds projects to improve conditions and working practices in the textile industry and helps the environment by reducing waste, carbon emissions and consumption. They also educate people on the environment and people’s lives, and how to make more sustainable choices.

After learning about the impact I have when buying and getting rid of clothes, I will become more sustainable by donating unwanted clothes to charity and buying second hand clothing. I will think more about buying a new item of clothing by thinking “Do I really need this?” and “How long will I have this in my wardrobe for?”.

To make our pop up store event successful we can market it on social media, make it a fun experience by having young people post pictures with the hashtag #secondhandfirst and educate people on the social and environmental impacts their buying choices have. This information should make them aware of making sustainable choices.

TRAID Mission Statement - By Lucy Barfoot

Our commitment is to create emotional connections with customers through inspiring them to make sustainable choices to help the environment and society. Our profits will help fund projects to create safe and healthy working practices.

TRAID Pop Up

On 30th January 2018, we did a pop up shop for TRAID.

Everyone was put into groups of:

Marketing- design posters and create a playlist
PR – invite companies, hand out flyers; social media- snapchat and Instagram stories
Logistics- organise staff breaks, tills and donations
Buying – choose stock for the store; visual merchandising – floor plan and mannequins

The key factors for our success was teamwork, completing the tasks on time and being supportive of one another. We managed to raise £563.74 and over £1200 for the whole week.

I was part of the PR group, we had to invite companies and hand out flyers getting potential customers to visit our store. We went to all the local universities and schools to get our target audience to the store, we also handed out flyers at tube stations such as Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Circus.

I believe we did raise awareness for TRAID objectives as we shared it on social media and made videos about being sustainable, ethical and taking care of the environment. We handed out leaflets to our customers and thanked them for making a contribution to becoming more sustainable and helping TRAID. Our advert included key facts about sustainability mentioning that we waste 3000 tonnes of clothing each year and if we buy #secondhandfirst we can save clothes from being wasted. The profits went towards funding international development projects to improve conditions and working practices in the textile industry.

Our pop up store was relevant to our target audience as the clothes had been donated by people aged between 16-21. We dressed the mannequins in outfits which would be suitable for young people, we had RnB pop and top of the charts music playing in our store to make it a fun vibrant place. There were videos playing around the store and posters all over the walls. We were also selling cakes, doughnuts and sweets by the till to get extra money for TRAID.

Through this unit I have learnt how to become more sustainable with my spending habits. When I go shopping I always think “do I really need this”, to make myself aware of the clothing I already have. I do clothes swap with my friends to buy second hand clothing before shopping in stores. If I buy clothes second hand I would rather buy them from a charity to shop so my money makes a difference. I bought a few pieces of clothing from our TRAID pop up store, so I could help make a contribution to the international projects which help improve conditions and working practices in the textile industry. When I am getting rid of clothes I now donate them to charity stores so they are not wasted.

If I was to do the project again I would have posted more videos on our social media as we only focused on Instagram stories. We could have made a Facebook Live, written blog posts on twitter, Facebook and snapchat to spread the word. We could have made an event on Facebook as this would have been of interest to many other people.

I can make an environmental change to our planet and the fashion retail industry by buying second hand clothing, giving old clothes to charity and promoting sustainability by educating more people about the environment and poverty.

How You Can Help The Charity:

For you to get involved and help the charity, please donate you clothing to TRAID. You can do this by contacting TRAID for a house pickup or by putting the clothing into the TRAID banks.

For more information head to the TRAID website – https://traid.org.uk/