Over 5000 Items of Clothing Donated at Street Store Auckland

Media Release

8th December 2014

Over 5000 Items of Clothing Donated at Street Store Auckland

Over 5000 items of clothing and shoes were donated yesterday to the Street Store – the international crusade sweeping the globe designed to draw people together by creating a pop up store for people experiencing homelessness.

“We are overwhelmed by the generosity of Aucklanders who are clearly keen to help people less fortunate and even Shortland Street star, Kimberly Crossman donated some incredible clothes yesterday,” says Street Store organiser, Julian Beacham.

“It was incredible to see hundreds of cars driving up to the Street Store and dropping off good quality clothing, shoes, bathroom essentials and bed linen as well as thousands of people passing-by either walking or driving along Quay Street also becoming more conscious of people experiencing homelessness. This day symbolises significant levels of community engagement and response. It was an inspiring and happy day for us all,” says Street Store organizer, Julian Beecham.

Up to 250 people experiencing homelessness (completely housing deprived) collected clothes and shoes and hundreds of people in unfortunate circumstances including families suffering from poverty as well as people living in cars also collected clothing.

Approximately 3500 items were collected by people experiencing homelessness or those in unfortunate circumstances and 25 extra cardboard boxes full of clothes were leftover most of which were donated to Auckland City Mission or put into nearby clothing recycle stations for other charities.

“We are incredibly happy to play an ongoing part in this initiative and endeavor to take it across New Zealand to help those marginalized in our society,’ says Pop Up Now by Spaceworks, Managing Director Lizzi Hines.

Julian is focused on resolving homelessness in New Zealand within two years and is now entering planning stages of how this will be achieved.

“The Street Store was one small step in another direction, it’s now time to take an evolutionary leap and resolve homelessness in our society for good,” Beacham concluded.

- Ends -

© Scoop Media