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Organise your own clothes swap event

Get together with your friends, family or community to share, refresh your wardrobe and save the planet.

We’ve put together some tips and hints to help you get things right. Whether you’re planning something small at home, or a bigger event for a wider audience, follow these simple steps for a successful swap.

How to organise a swap

1. Decide on a date and where you are going to host your swap

Swaps can be perfect for a night in with your friends, or get your community involved. Such as your:

  • faith group,
  • sports team,
  • youth group,
  • other community groups.

Would your local:

  • school,
  • pub,
  • café or book group like to hold a swap event?

2. Download our Swap event templates, and design your own flyer

  • Templates for posters which you can print out if you’re organising an event,
  • Templates for putting together your own flyer to share on social media such as: Whatsapp, Instagram or Facebook.

You can also create your own flyers.

3. Prepare for your event

Think about how you will display the clothing people bring (e.g. on a clothes rail, shelves ). Ask around to see if anyone can help you with this.

Get tokens ready to give people for each item they bring with them.

4. Hold your swap

As people bring items, you might want to check them to make sure they’re clean and in good condition. 

Give attendees a token for each item they bring. Each token can be redeemed for one swapped item.

5. Leftover clothes

Charities such as TRAID are happy to pick up leftover clothes. You can also arrange this in advance with TRAID if you are hosting a larger event and you are sure you will have items left over.

Top tips

  • A well-organised swap helps people find their dream item. Getting attendees to drop off items before swapping starts means you have got time to organise and display things before your event starts.

Hangers and clothes rails

  • If you are doing a small event, ask people to bring their own hangers with their clothing. Label them so each person can take their hangers home after.
  • If you are doing a larger event, you might want to get tables to display clothes, or see if you can pickup second-hand clothes hangers from:
    • market stalls,
    • shops, or
    • sharing platforms like Olio or Gumtree.
  • Ask around to see if anyone can bring a clothes rail along – it makes a big difference to the swapping experience. At a pinch, broom handles and curtain rails can both substitute. But they’re not as convenient for browsing.

Baby clothes

  • If there’s going to be lots of baby or children’s clothes, see if anyone can lend some baskets or boxes to help you organise clothes by size. Tiny clothes can be difficult to organise by size and can take up a surprising amount of table space.

Other ways to Recycle and reuse your clothes and textiles

See more information on other ways to recycle and reuse your clothes and textiles