Why we're launching a new 'value' shop in York - Ricky Mohindra, St Leonard’s Hospice

This is astonishing, but not surprising given the way people are tightening their belts and watching their outgoings at the moment.

So, we’re really excited to be getting ready to open our first ‘Value Shop’ in the city, focusing on a full range of pre-loved clothing items which represent even greater value for shoppers. This is our first venture of this kind and we now feel the time is right.

The way it works is that items which haven’t been sold elsewhere, will be moved from across the chain, to a specially refurbished shop in the Tang Hall area of York and then sold at a discounted price.

In addition to adult and children’s clothing, the shop will also offer assorted homeware, children’s toys, selected media products and books. The pricing strategy which has been selected for all the items is simple – all products will be priced at £1, £2 or £3. People can select single items, as well as multiple buys at these low prices.

We are always planning and adapting our retail process here at St Leonard’s and this new shop is part of our strategy to get more value out of people’s donations and drive more revenue to support the hospice.

The current process involves quite a lot of items being sold to the ragging trade, when they don’t sell quickly. We don’t always have the space to hold these for long periods so we’ve designed a system which works better for everyone.

We’re absolutely committed to getting the best possible value for the items which people kindly donate. At the same time, we will be helping our shoppers to get a better deal as their budgets tighten.

The shop which has been closed since October 15 during a refurbishment and we’ll reopen it on November 10. It will simply be called ‘St Leonard’s Value Shop – Tang hall’.

Like other charities, we’ve been trying to reduce the amount of unsold items and extract more value out of the items donated.

This is more important than ever in the current financial situation. Like many charities across the country, during the pandemic, we saw general donations reduce. The Charity Commission has confirmed that the Covid pandemic affected service delivery, fundraising income and staffing issues across most charities.

So the time is right for us to be doing this. It is the first time St Leonard’s has set up a specialist shop of this kind and we’re really pleased to be able to offer this new concept. We know that people come from far and wide to visit our shops, so we expect it will help attract more people to the city too.

Moving items, which don’t sell in main shops, to so called value shop, is an established retail process which other retail store chains already do successfully. By adopting this system, we know we can get the most out of these valued donations and at the same time support our community in these challenging financial times.

The Charity Retail Association estimates that around 339,000 tonnes of textiles are kept from being disposed of each year to landfill or incineration, saving councils at least £31m each year in waste disposal charges. So we really feel that we’re doing our bit here in York.

Ricky Mohindra is head of retail at York Charity St Leonard’s Hospice.