With over three shops across Lagos and more to launch soon, Its New To Me, a charity shop project set up by His Love Foundation, the charity arm of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), sells new and fairly-used cloths and household items donated by church members at small amounts to the less-privileged.In this interview with select journalists in Lagos, Olubukola Aneke, chief operating officer of the charity organisation, gives insight on the operations of the shops. INIOBONG IWOK was there. Excerpts:
‘Its New To Me’ initiative seems unique, what informed it?
It started 10 years ago, but I came into the picture five years ago when we re-launched. That was also when I started volunteering, moved on to supervising what was going on here, and later became the chief operation officer.
Not minding my position, I am helping in coordinating this place, which is a charity shop and an initiative of the Redeem Christian Church of God, City of David.
The vision is to demonstrate the love of Jesus by changing lives and we carry this out by retailing donated items by families and church members.
We retail the items, generate funds through it and forward the funds to other charity works in the church. So, that is the plan, it has been wonderful and impactful for five years.
We have clothed people, offered hope, made people’s wish to come true, and have been able to wipe tears from the face of the needy.
There was an instance of a widow that came to complain that since her husband’s death she has not been wearing good cloths. Apparently the husband was a wealthy man and she could afford good things then, but now subjected to ridicule among her friends.
So, she was happy coming here to buy goods and cloths with little amount. I cannot say how much she came with, but she was able to fill a bag. She was happy she could mingle with her friends again.
Does it mean the motives for setting up the place was just to help the less-privileged afford ordinary things they could not?
I know it was the vision of Pastor Iluyomade and to demonstrate the love of Jesus. But the little I have heard is that just like the name; it suggests something that is odd to some people. I may have something that I feel is outdated, but someone may like it. I went through Oxfam history yesterday and I saw something that captivated me, it is a picture that said; ‘say no to second-hand items’. So, items that we have here are replica of new items.
How many branches do you have in Lagos?
We launched five years ago, and re-strategised. We have another launching coming up because we want to expand beyond Victoria Island, Lagos. We now have three more shops that are operational, but we have not launched them officially. Our shops are in Akoka, Ikoyi, and Ikorodu. They are selling but we have not launched. But we would want to have more because Oxfam is the bench mark with about 750 shops globally. We hope to get there.
On the average, how much does it cost to buy a cloth here?
We have items and cloths for as low as N100, N200, and N300. But, we do not stock ordinary things because the calibre of people that bring things here are people that God has blessed.
There are shoes that seem that they have never been worn, but it is just that those people did not walk on the kind of ground that destroys shoes. So, it is just like when you are buying it new because they are not worn out.
Has the church or any of the donor partners thought of importing these second hand items?
The church is making sure that all of us are involved in touching lives. If I import the items, it means that I have subverted the purpose of the programme.
The idea is not to import things, it is not business, and from the name, it is for the people to work together and touch lives.
But large section of the church members and other Lagosians are not aware of the project?
No, on the contrarily, the church would love all members to hear about it. Just like I said, it started with a branch at City of David, later grew to a love foundation and we are set to launch more shops. It is the platform of His Love Foundation, which covers all Redeemed churches, but City of David founded it and fortunately Pastor Iluyomade is still the one in charge of His love Foundation. The pastor is the one assisting our General Overseer in that regard. From now, it would be open to all Redeemed church branches.
Tell us how you get donors?
We have established relationship with our people and they do bring things. What we do is to announce and it serves as reminder that the shops is existing. But that would change; we would do flyers and we would not restrict it to City of David. We would take it to other branches, do road works, take it to people and create awareness.
Are you going to open shops in remote areas?
Like I said, we started with City of David, it is a branch of the church that is known for class, but we are not going to say we are dealing with commoners. Our benchmark is Oxfam. They want stigmatisation to be taken out, and we want to maintain that class, at the same time, they want to reach out to people. So, when people are coming in and seeing this kind of place, they would be happy, because we have a shop that can match high street shop, and we would still get the kind of things you get in Oshodi in a high street shop. We have been looking for a shop in Ajegunle, we have not been able to get, we got one in Ebute Metta that we are going to pay in one or two days’ time. We got a place in Cemetery Road, maybe it is going to be prettier than the others. But we got a very good shop there and it is coming up soon. I do not know about the plan to go to Oshodi, I do not think it is part of the plan for now.
But we have one in Ikorodu, at Odogunyon, another one in Akoka, and we are planning for about 10 other locations. We are not just planning for highbrow areas; we plan to go into places that are occupied by less privileged individuals.
In the past, the church was noted for carrying out welfare programmes, like visiting motherless babies’ homes, but we need to strike a balance?
We want to use one stone to kill two birds. The first impact is that we cloth, the second is that we raise funds. We have done two things; donating to mother less babies homes is achieving just one thing, but we are achieving two things with this. We would cloth you and make you to contribute to charity works because the funds go to charity works. That money would be paying school fees and medical bills. The church pays for dialyses of people every week.
We do this and direct part of the funds to other charity works when necessary. Some people do not want to give money, but they want to do charity work when necessary. They have more than enough, what we do is often to reach out to them to donate.
Do you have a way of repackaging the items to look good?
Some of the donated items are still in good conditions that you begin to wonder why they bought them. When someone buys a bag or shoe for N500,000 and we resell it here for N1,000, N2500, but if I tell such person to donate the N500, 000 cash they would not give me. Basically, that is how we raise funds from here and there. It is obvious that what we have here are not looking bad and I can tell you these are leftovers. We have drop boxes where people drop the donated item and we wash and iron them before bringing them here and before sending them to different locations for sales. We advised our donors to put the things they want to donate in good shape; but sometimes the items are not really good, there are some you cannot even give to beggars.
Do you also accept other items?
We have had furniture, kitchen and other items, but we accepted them. It is only human beings that we do not sell.
Is buying items in the shop basically for only Christians?
No, the shop is open to everybody, both Christians and non-Christians are free to come in and shop. We are thanking God for His grace and pray for more grace to be able to achieve the goals we set for ourselves.
What is the projection of the shop in the coming years?
We have to add at least 10 shop branches in another five years. We should have about 20 people a day and at least 100 people coming in a week to benefit from the good work. We believe in the next five years we would have impacted about two million people, who would not only hear but had benefited in one way or the other.
Are there challenges?
You know the things we sell are donations, may be, if people do not give, that may be a challenge. But God has been bringing people to give to us.
Are there instances where people who had benefited come back?
Yes, there are instances and we have opened a book for such testimonies. Sometime ago, an intending couple came here to shop. They bought wedding gown for N2, 000; native cloths that could be worn for wedding, shoes and bags. We have also seen mothers who come here to buy baby items.
