British Red Cross shops enjoy record retail week
Howard Lake | 8 December 2006 | News
Last week was the most successful to date for the British Red Cross’s chain of 350 charity shops. The charity beat its previous record set at the beginning of November by £70,000.
Sue Azzopardi, Head of Trading at the British Red Cross, has reported that average shop takings were up £400 on the the rest of 2006. This is despite the fact that there are now 30 fewer Red Cross shops than there were two years ago.
Last week’s record-breaking amount came in week 48, whereas the best sales week in 2005 came a week later.
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The British Red Cross has been encouraging its shop staff and volunteers to try to beat the record by holding special events. For example, a designer evening at the Kensington shop in London helped push the sales over £22,000 for the week.
The British Red Cross has increased its investment in trading in the form of rebranding its shops, improving performance management, re-launching its ‘Shop Around’ quarterly in-shop magazine,’ which features shop league tables, and the introduction of the sale of new goods in stores aimed at attracting those people who don’t usually use charity shops.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.