DAKS INTRODUCES: ROYAL TRINITY HOSPICE RETAIL DIRECTOR TO LAUNCH OUR 'TAKE BACK' SCHEME

The Take Back Scheme is a simple, free of charge add on to any DAKS purchase. When adding the donation bag to your basket, you will be sent the DAKS x Royal Trinity Hospice ‘Take Back’ Bag in which you can fill all your preloved pieces to be returned (free of charge) to the Royal Trinity Hospice team.

 DAKS Team x Daniel Holloway

I joined Royal Trinity Hospice as Director of Retail in 2019. In that time, we have opened new shops, closed others, managed the impact of the pandemic, made some great partnerships with world-famous brands like DAKS and done a whole lot to support our charity and champion Royal Trinity Hospice shops as “London’s answer to sustainable fashion”.

Royal Trinity Hospice is a charity providing specialist palliative and end of life care and support to Londoners with life-limiting illness. Every pound raised in Royal Trinity Hospice shops goes towards the hospice’s goal of providing free, tailored, and expert care to people who need it. What is great about our shops is that we can also champion sustainable fashion, which so many of us are passionate about, at the same time. And thanks to the rapidly growing interest in sustainable and preloved fashion, the more we talk about the environment, promote the benefits of shopping sustainably and showcase the incredible stock we are fortunate to have donated, the more money we raise for the hospice.  

Royal Trinity Hospice is a charity. The NHS contributes about 25% of the £16m it costs us to provide free care to over 2,600 patients and their family members and carers every year. The rest of that £16m we have to raise. My team and I run 21 shops across central and southwest London. Together, these shops raise £6m annually, which, combined with donations and funds raised from other types of fundraising, keeps our doors open, our care free and the quality of what we do exceptional. We simply could not exist without the generosity of the people who live in the communities where we have shops. Their donations of great quality, one-of-a-kind fashion and accessories, keep our shops stocked and ensure they are desirable, must-visit destinations for fans of preloved shopping. But we are also so fortunate to work directly with big brands such as DAKS who donate new and almost new items to us for sale in our shops. It all adds to the magic of the shopping experience with Trinity when you know that you can be browsing through a rail and a stunning DAKS item in perfect condition jumps out at you!

We have been fortunate to have DAKS as a partner since 2016. We were thrilled to have them come on board and show their commitment to sustainable fashion by supporting us in this way. Since the start on our partnership, we have raised a phenomenal £114,000 for our free hospice care thanks to their donations. What is great about the partnership with DAKS is the incredible quality of the samples and archive pieces they donate – they really contribute to giving Royal Trinity Hospice shops the wow-factor which keeps people coming back to our shops and allowing us to continue funding our care. The DAKS items that are donated are a firm fanfavourite with our regular customers, many of whom are born and bred Londoners who know DAKS from their Simpsons of Piccadilly days. 

5. Why did you want to work with DAKS on your first Take Back Scheme? Every item that Royal Trinity Hospice shops sell is donated – we never buy in stock to sell-on. This is something we are really proud of as it cements our commitment to sustainable fashion. However, it means we constantly need great quality donations to keep our customers coming back. The DAKS Take Back scheme will provide us with a new source of items to sell in our shops and, because it’s through the post, some people will find it a more convenient way to donate rather than coming into our shops in person. We are excited to see what might get donated as we already know that our donors have great taste – they are DAKS customers after all! The other fantastic thing about the new Take Back Scheme is that DAKS customers from all over the country will be able to donate their items, knowing that they are donating to a charity whose shops value great quality donations, treat them well and use the money raised to fund vital work supporting Londoners. To me, that feels like a natural partnership for a brand like DAKS with such a strong London heritage. I couldn’t think of a brand that would be a better fit for our first Take Back Scheme partnership.

We don’t like to stand still at Royal Trinity Hospice shops, so we naturally have some very exciting plans in the pipeline, starting with a brand new shop opening in Brixton soon which we are really excited to share with everyone. The best way to be the first to know about new partnerships like this one with DAKS, new shops and stock drops is by joining our mailing list or following us on Instagram! We hope to continue working with DAKS for a long time to come and are excited to see what happens with the Take Back Scheme – it’s the first time we have partnered with a brand in this way and we are really optimistic that it will provide yet another way that people can donate the items they no longer want, to raise money for our charity and ultimately allow us to reach more people with our care. Our ambition is to continue to champion sustainable fashion, offer a peerless charity shopping experience and of course, to raise as much as we can to ensure everyone who needs the care of our specialist nurses and doctors, can get it when and where they need.

For more information on the DAKS x Royal Trinity Hospice partnership and a step by step How To for the 'Take Back' Bags, follow the below links: 

Press Release / Step by step how to