A Stafford-based hospice has been trialling a new project that shows customers in its charity shops how much CO₂ has been saved by making a second-hand purchase.
Katharine House Hospice, which provides palliative care services, claims it is the first charity to show sustainability savings in its shops.
The charity is using till displays, provided by Eproductive, which calculate the average CO₂ required to make the items brand new and show the total sustainability savings made by buying second-hand.
The charity has been trialling this project in 14 of its charity shops since August and is now encouraging shoppers to buy sustainably over Christmas.
KHH estimated that buying an outfit of seven items will save about 32.3kg of CO₂, which is just more than the amount of CO₂ used when driving 80 miles in an average car.
One customer, who had saved about 40.2kg of CO₂ when shopping with the charity, said: “More charities should definitely be doing this, if you know how much CO₂ you are saving each time then why not share it.”
Simon Dodd, retail general manager at KHH, said: “We want to get the sustainability message across to every customer as second-hand shopping is great for the environment, so the fact that the CO₂ savings flash up on the screen is a good way of doing this.
“It’s great that we can tell customers real figures of how much good each sale is doing and the difference that shopping with us is making, and to be the first in the UK to do it is amazing.
Dodd added that the charity hoped to encourage people to shop sustainably this Christmas and keep more items out of landfill.
He also said he hoped the charity sector could work together to expand the data for standard CO₂ savings across all departments such as furniture and electronics.