Admins

Admins are emails sent to your whole community, either responding to a problem that's come up or sharing good news - for example a membership milestone, or a stall at the local green fair.

Since January 2025, Admins can be sent in two formats: Essential or Newsletter. This split was introduced because many members objected to receiving non-essential information - see https://discourse.ilovefreegle.org/t/admins-and-newsletters/8178 for the explanation.

In July 2026, weekly local community news digests were launched on ChitChat and via email. These are compiled and sent out nationally. There is a per-group setting so local moderators can choose whether weekly community news updates are enabled for their area.

Below is a selection of standard Admins. Use them as they are, or adapt them to your community's needs.

Issues

Send these in response to problems that commonly arise.

• Animals - no Offer or Wanted messages
• Be nice - reminder to members to Be Nice
• Autoresponders
• Collecting Offers - reminder about arranging safe collection of items
• Copyright
• Crossposting
• Fair Chance policy
• Fundraising - appeal for funding
• Inappropriate Messages - Admin after an inappropriate message has been posted
• Keep it Local
• Keep safe - reminder about personal safety
• Multiple posts
• No-shows
• Reselling - 4 messages about selling items
• Sob stories
• Too many emails - explaining to members how to change their email settings
• Too many wanteds
• Virus warnings
• Woodburning stoves - with particular reference to not using furniture that could still be used
• Zero Tolerance

Auto Admins

There is a bank of automatic Admins that appear in your Admin settings on ModTools from time to time, suggesting an Admin to send to encourage more freegling. These are generated centrally, and you can edit them, post them out, or ignore them. They're categorised as newsletters (not essential). The current messages are on this Google Doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1e5zyMNwiaAtdxHP7fFkuPy4bLu-VAGmfgJOBClmqHD8/edit?usp=drivesdk

Use the community

Individual Admins that encourage more freegling:

• Bank Holiday - encouraging freegling rather than tipping
• New local community opened
• Spring Cleaning!
• Christmas

Techy Admins

Technical innovations and explanations:

• Events - about the facility to publicise community events
• Feedback system

Links

• Volunteer (Moderator) Recruiting
• Sample Messages
• ModTools#Admins