How to declutter without throwing anything away
When we throw something away, it doesn’t go away, it goes to landfill or incineration. And obviously that isn’t great for the environment, so in an ideal world, we wouldn’t throw anything away – we would aim for zero waste decluttering. So how can we do that?
Sell the item
There are a lot of places to sell your unwanted stuff – eBay, Facebook Marketplace, Vinted and car boot sales to name a few. Not everything will sell easily though, so if that doesn’t work, there are other things you can do.
Give it away
- Leave it outside your house with a note saying take for free
- Give it to a friend
- Donate it to an old age home
- Give it to an animal shelter
- Take it to a school, university or nursery
- Give it to a wood store
- Give it away on Freecycle or Freegle or Facebook marketplace
Swap it
Find a clothes swap party or host your own. I hosted a clothes swap party once and people brought far more clothes than they took. I ended up taking all the leftover clothes to charity. So if you want to host a clothes swap party and you are able to get leftover clothes to a charity shop or drop off point, then don’t worry about making clothes swap rules e.g. one item in, for one item out. However if you don’t want clothes left at the end, then you might need to put down a few ground rules.
Mend it
Sew up the tears, superglue things back together. Use sugru* or polyfilla to fill in holes and sticky tape (in it’s different forms – masking tape, duct tape* etc) can fix a lot of things.
If it’s a bit more complicated or technical, often there is a Youtube video that can show you how to do it.
Another alternative is to find your local repair cafe, where you can get help repairing your things.
Recycle it
If you can’t recycle it at home, you might be able to recycle it at a recycling centre. Check out what can be recycled locally.
Sometimes even with the best will in the world there will still be things that do have to go into the bin. But a lot less will go in the bin, if you try out these steps first.
Need some help?
Do you need help to work out what should go where? I can help you sort through your things and advise on where you could take your unwanted stuff. Get in touch to find out more.
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