Petworth shop owner collects donations of new underwear for clothing banks and refuges

Sally Matson, who owns Red Card in Petworth High Street, decided to set up Brief Request after helping out with the Haslemere Clothing Bank.

The clothing bank was set up by a friend who noticed that, due to charity shops being closed during lockdown, people were struggling to get hold of clothes.

Mrs Matson has been helping deliver clothes donations to families and refuges, where she said: “Some people have been turning up with only the clothes they are standing in.”

Doing this work made her realise there was nowhere for people to get new underwear. Charity shops do not sell them and clothing banks do not given them out.

This means people most in need are doing without.

“There are more people in crisis at the moment,” she said. “There are people who can’t really afford anything.”

Mrs Matson decided to ask people to donate brand new underwear of all kinds – for men and women, old and young – which she can then distribute.

Donations can be made directly to Red Card, which reopened on Monday, where a brightly coloured underwear post box painted by Mrs Matson’s daughter has been installed.

She said the scheme was going well so far, describing it as ‘something positive that has come out of these really extraordinary times’.

Anyone unable to deliver underwear can also make a donation via the crowdfunding page here.

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