Shwopper's delight
Home » Blog » Lynda Brendish » Shwopper's delightCurious about shwopping? Good sussed out the event at The Big Shwop held in Auckland last weekend
The fashion industry is notorious for its waste and events like The Big Shwop were created to allow environmentally-minded fashionistas some guilt-free indulgence. I traipsed along Sunday to the Auckland shwop at The Langham to see just how this whole thing works.
As I blogged before the Shwop, the idea is to bring along your barely-worn, good quality clothes and swap each item for a voucher that allows you to take home any of the other items on offer.
The organizers really work hard to make the Shwop an experience and they do pretty well in this respect. This year there were two speakers – Trilogy communications manager Undine Marshfield and fashion designer Annah Stretton – as well as free glasses of wine, goodies from ecostore and Trilogy and an issue of Mindfood magazine.
Trilogy offered to swap you its cleansers in exchange for your old, almost-empty non-Trilogy one. I felt slightly guilty handing in my empty supermarket cheapie and getting a lovely tube of Trilogy in return. Somehow I think I got the better end of that deal!
The disappointing part for me was that I left empty-handed. I had taken along three really nice items of clothing – hardly worn – but found nothing in my size that I liked. And that’s one of the problems with an event like this; you have to be prepared, unless there is a good ratio of clothing to people, to leave empty-handed or with something less-than-perfect.
Anyway, it was a fun event and despite my losses I had a good time – after all, it was for a good cause.
Tips for would-be Shwoppers
- Donations run from 10-12 and then there is a one-hour intermission while the clothes are set up. So if you’re arriving early, go for brunch or an early lunch at a nearby café.
- Be there promptly at 1pm when the doors open for the actual shwop. Once they do, it’s a free-for-all and the best clothes are quickly picked over.
- If you feel disappointed at the prospect of an empty-handed return, take fewer clothes along in the first place. Taking one or two items along and returning with none is going to be a softer blow than taking the maximum of 20 and finding nothing you like.
- Take along only barely-worn, quality clothing in good nick. The Shwop organizers run a tight ship making sure clothes are in decent condition and won’t accept things that aren’t up to standard.
- Be prepared for the determination of other shwoppers. More than once I was a pace or two away from an item only to have it snatched out from in front of me by a much quicker woman. There was no fighting or animosity, but it is definitely every woman for herself.
- If you have the time, hang around as long as you can. The organizers work hard to bring discarded clothes back to the racks from the changing rooms, meaning you often see a new selection on racks every few minutes.
So all-in-all go along for the girly good fun but be prepared to take a loss on the clothing you bring, though hopefully as the event grows, this will be less of an issue.
