New ACACIA charity shop in Wootton welcomes floods of customers

ACACIA charity shop opened in Wootton near Abingdon on Saturday 14 to floods of new customers.

The new charity shop offers a wide range of pre-loved items, including ladies, men’s and children’s clothes and accessories, books, toys, and bric-a-brac, the new shop will have a plastic bottle refill station for household and hair and beauty products and a small café area offering coffee, tea and snacks.

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ACACIA charity shops have been a feature of the South Oxfordshire retail landscape for many years with shops in Abingdon, Faringdon and Grove, raising hundreds of thousands of pounds over the years to fund education projects in Africa.

Laura Horton area manager for the charity has been working at the shop. She said: “The opening was really good the shop was really busy, and we took a huge amount of money for the charity. The donations have been swamping, we are buried in the at the moment.

“Every customer coming in thought the shop looked amazing and they are so glad to have something like this.”

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ACACIA has recently become the trading subsidiary of Oxfordshire charity Rafiki Thabo Foundation.

The charity shops help children in Kenya, Uganda and Lesotho – including those living with disabilities – to fulfil their potential through education.

The charities school scholarship pays school and college fees to enable 250 children and young people to continue with their education.

An initiative that provides 70 children at a rural secondary school in Uganda with a hot meal every day, helps prevent school children from dropping out of school. The charity also helps to provide electricity to classrooms and install IT equipment.

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ACACIA funds specific projects to help children with disabilities thrive in school. Their funding has enabled its partners to offer therapy to children, train parents to provide their children with therapy, providing assistive devices and renovating a hydrotherapy pool.

Janet Hayes, director of Rafiki Thabo Foundation, said: “We are so excited to be opening our fourth ACACIA charity shop, this time in the lovely village of Wootton.

“Charity shopping is becoming increasingly popular as we all become more aware of the need to shop sustainably, and we are delighted to also be able to offer the community of Wootton the opportunity to reduce their single use plastic consumption too – as well as a decent cup of coffee which we have been told loud and clear the community is crying out for.”

The shop on Besselsleigh Road parade of shops and will be open 9am to 5pm Mondays to Saturdays.

Read more from this author

This story was written by Rebecca Whittaker, she joined the team in 2019 as a multimedia reporter.

Rebecca covers education and news in Abingdon and Wantage.

Get in touch with her by emailing: Rebecca.Whittaker@newquest.co.uk or calling 07824524333

Follow her on Twitter @RebecWhitt

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