Joe Dorset: Rotorua's Habitat for Humanity ReStore manager
A Rotorua charity store has set up a contactless donation scheme for people to drop off goods after their "lockdown declutter".
The Habitat for Humanity's ReStore charity shop on Edmund Rd was taking online bookings for people to do a contactless drop-off of any goods they wanted to donate.
After seeking health advice on how long the virus could live on items, they decided each item would be held in quarantine until it was deemed safe to move in-store.
Store manager Joe Dorset says the support from the local community has been positive about the new venture.
Habitat for Humanity ReStore charity shop manager Joe Dorset said the community response had been positive. Photo / Andrew Warner
He says people have been understanding and adaptable and so far, it has been a success.
"When the doors open for in-store shopping again, there will be plenty of treasures ready for our customers to hunt through - and plenty of bargains."
The team is taking a stab at contactless sales through the window too as the local Four Square's queues often had people outside their front window.
Habitat for Humanity Central North Island chief executive Nic Greene says it has been "really challenging" for the organisation over lockdown providing support to clients while having near to no income.
The organisation helped house the vulnerable in the community by providing rental properties, homeownership schemes and repair services.
Their home ownership scheme had got a decent number of local low-income families into owning their own homes, while their rental properties housed a lot of vulnerable Rotorua pensioners.
They also do free repairs on low-income family homes to ensure they are warm, safe and dry coming into the colder months, he says.
The income from the charity stores allows them to do all of these things, he says.
Over lockdown, they had tried to sell essential goods on TradeMe but it had not been a huge success.
Things had picked up more in level three, but they were still having trouble getting the momentum up, Nic says.
It is also daunting as no new donations are coming in and they are fearful of running out of stock once the doors reopened, he says.
Habitat for Humanity ReStore charity shop manager Joe Dorset said the community response had been positive. Photo / Andrew Warner
However, Nic says he is sure that people would have had a lot of time to "lockdown declutter" and he wants them to know that they are keen to take things off their hands.
The donation scheme had been going since Monday and a few people had taken advantage of it, he says.
Anyone looking for more information can head to the Habitat for Humanity website.
