If you don’t ask you don’t get!

Out running in late Nov 2023 I spotted a sign in Fenwick’s window “Vintage Sample Sale”, pausing the running watch I decided to have a look. It wasn’t vintage but there was a whole floor of samples/ ends of lines. This led to the thinking and imagining of Charity Super.Mkt on Bond Sreet, could we be the first ever charity store to retail on this iconic and immensely up-market street?

When I got back to the HemingwayDesign studio I hopped onto good old LinkedIn, and reached out to the Fenwick CEO, John Edgar who got back to me within 24 hours, having learnt that Fenwick were weeks away from leaving Bond St and would be concentrating on their 7 other stores, we discussed the idea of using the store’s empty space for Charity Super.Mkt to hold a pop up, for the last couple of weeks of Fenwicks ownership. With a huge desire from Fenwicks to support charities, some creative thinking pulled together the idea that we could screen off the handbag and accessories section, whilst behind the scenes the store would continue to be packed down.

From that first LinkedIn meeting to getting Charity Super.Mkt open, Fenwick has been nothing but helpful, kind and generous. The Store Director Mark Turner sorted us out with rails and everything else the team needed to set up, their PR team helped us get a tremendous amount of press , Fenwick staff joined in steaming and hanging the clothes as they were delivered from the charities. They even built pop up changing rooms and on the opening night provided a team of ever so helpful security guards along with the posts and rope to cope with the crowds.

We had no idea if charity second-hand would work on Bond St (listed as one of the world's top ten streets) and resigned ourselves to the fact that as a minimum the charities would get some great exposure and we could use this as a mouthpiece to get us on to our dream destination Oxford Street !

However, the queue outside on that opening evening put paid to that concern. From a record breaking first ever launch event in January 2023 at Brent Cross (our first store), where we overturned £8.8K in one night, to a year later where not only the location status of our pop-ups grew but so did the sales. Overturning a whopping £15.5k in Just four hours, leaving us with a 74% sales increase a year on!

Bond St has sealed the deal that Charity Super.Mkt can work in any great location and reminds us why we set up Charity Super.MKt in the first instant, a charity second-hand crusade to get charity retail into the spaces and places that they would not usually be able to access - and the best part to make a shed load of money for their great work !

Check out our impact stats from our two weeks on Bond Street Below…