Freegle Reps Report 2013-01-31
This Report covers the period from mid December 2012 to end January 2013.
STRATEGY
Simplifying Reuse
We are discussing a paper prepared by Cat and Edward. It is a development of the proof of concept for a website that is is aimed at being a single point of contact for participating organisations for a wide range of reuse options.
REPS ELECTION
The annual Reps election was held between 11 December 2012 and 20 December 2012. Sian and Ollie stood down, Cat and Edward stood again and were re-elected. Sheila and Tina filled the vacant positions. http://wiki.ilovefreegle.org/Freegle_Reps
Sian and Ollie were both signatories for the Freegle bank account and the nominated postholders for HMRC registration. Following the requirements of Unity Bank we convened a meeting of the Reps on 23 January 2013 at which all the Reps were in attendance. We formally resolved that there will be 4 signatories in total to this account – Edward Hibbert, Jane Loveday, Jacky Barrett and Tina Willcox.
Jane (Treasurer) will have View and Submit internet access, Edward, Jacky and Tina - View, Submit and Authorise access and Ray (Auditor) View only. We have removed Jean's (previous Auditor) view access.
PUBLICITY
Cat, Queen of Freebies, the Human Womble
At the beginning of the year we received an enormous boost to our publicity with Daily Mail articles.
Freegle made the no 1 UK search on Google and received 50 times our usual website traffic and groups benefited with large increases to membership. Cat prepared a press release for local groups to send out and this resulted in some excellent media coverage in the way of newpaper articles and radio and TV interviews.
This welcome publicity also resulted in a substantially increased workload, for example Edward and Cat were doing 20 hour days for a week or so to keep the IT and Media stuff going. It also had knock on effects for the Mailbox, GAT and other areas as more interest was generated. It’s great to get this kind of publicity boost, but this is more evidence that our current structure is not tenable longer term - we’d like to be dealing with an event like this every month, and it’s clear that we just couldn’t handle it.
Wastebuster
We will be included on this site and in their schools programme in the future
We can follow them on Facebook and Twitter.
https://www.facebook.com/Wastebuster
@Wastebuster
B&Q
We now have a very good link on their website
http://www.diy.com/content/marketing/one_planet_home/reuse.jsp?menu=eco
Their Facebook page is
https://www.facebook.com/bandq
and they can be followed as well on Twitter @BandQ
Galaxy Warmheart Promotion
Sheila has entered Freegle for this. There is £300 prize money.
http://www.hotgalaxywarmheart.com/
We agreed to send a bulk email to groups to use to send out to members asking for their support.
WRAP
Cat attended the WRAP Reuse Action Group Meeting on 16 January. Cat explained the business plan outlined in Simplyfying Reuse and they expressed interest in hearing more about this. She updated us on the forthcoming launch of communications that are being published to promote reuse which we will be able to make use of.
Ecobuild
Cat is working on the team building a waste totem pole at http://www.ecobuild.co.uk/ it's probably the biggest sustainable construction exhibition in the(the? Saira) world with over 50K attendees 5-7 March at ExCel in docklands area London
Follow on Twitter @Ecobuild_Now
Woman’s Own
We have a feature article in this magazine at the end of the month.
https://www.facebook.com/womansownmagazine
@WomansOwn
Business Cards
Sian let us know that she has continued to send out business cards to the New Groups Launch Coordinator and to groups who have already received cards but requested more
FINANCE
We proposed to Central changes to the Financial Management and Controls document
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FreegleUK-Central/message/33941
These were subsequently adopted on 30th January 2013.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FreegleUK-Central/message/35452.
The wiki has been amended.
http://wiki.ilovefreegle.org/Financial_Management_and_Controls.
We are discussing the budget for 2013/2014.
OTHER
Bring and Take Events
We were contacted by a local Trading Standards Officer with respect to offering electrical items at Give and Take Events. Current advice to volunteers on running Bring and Take events can be found on the wiki page
http://wiki.ilovefreegle.org/Give_and_Take
Bulk Mailing of Local Group Admins
We discussed the pros and cons of sending suggested admins/press releases to local groups for them to send out as admins on local groups by bulk mail. We decided to test whether this is worth doing by sending out an admin to all groups with a link to the press release about Cat’s articles in the Daily Mail. Groups were also asked to add their publicity contacts to a database via a link in the mail:
http://freegle.it/MediaContacts
Mobile App
Edward is having very promising discussions with a mobile app developer.
Delisting Brackley Freegle
We went through the agreed disaffiliation process and gave 7 days notice on Central Reluctantly we have now written to Brackley Freegle letting them know that they have been delisted.
IT
As a result of the Daily Mail article Edward added daily nodes temporarily. He also improved our ability to cope with the extra traffic by splitting ilovefreegle.org and direct.ilovefreegle.org on to different hosts.
We reviewed the volunteers who are able to edit our website and removed some who are no longer active. and added Jacky and Ray to allow them to send bulk emails for FreeSpOut.
Website Hosting - VPS
We have agreed with VPS that they may add a link to us on their website in return for a testimonial and case study.
Group Affiliation Team
We agreed that Andy (Oxford), Lori (Cherwell Valley), Teresa (Sandy and Biggleswade) and Christian (Wilmslow) will join the Team and that Sheila will be the Rep Observer on GAT.
USEFUL CONTACT EMAIL ADDRESSES FOR FREEGLE
can be found on this wiki page http://wiki.ilovefreegle.org/Contact_Details
Back to Freegle Reps Report 2012-11
