Hello everyone and happy November - Here’s part one of some special charity Christmas gifts blog posts!
I was getting the bus back from a friend’s house in North London this morning and passed along Oxford Street.
As you can imagine it was quite clear that the entire street is getting extremely geared up for Christmas - even at 9am the shops were replete with pretty twinkling lights and people already to congregating to buy presents for their friends and families.
It got me thinking about how we like to suggest to people to still get Christmas gifts, but to also consider getting them from charity gift shops. You can still got some amazing presents for yourselves, while feeling good that money made from your purchase furthers a number of good charitable causes.
Online charity gift shops (we’re not talking about high street charity shops) are a great alternative way to support non profits and charities of all genres have interesting and novel products to offer you.
In this article we’ll give a short summary of all the shops we list on this site with links to more information about what they sell.
WWF Animal Adoptions
These are extremely popular throughout the year - but at Christmas time we see a real surge in people getting animal adoption packages for their friends as WWF make it really easy for people to set up an adoption for a friend. They have a lot of options but the really popular ones over Christmas in our experience are the winter animals that include the polar bear, Adélie penguins, snow leopards - and also an ‘all in one’ package called the ‘Snow Pack’ where you can adopt all three of these frosty animals together. Brrrr! The price won't leave you feeling frosty, though, as adoptions start from only £3 a month - we think that's amazing.
What every you decide to join or adopt you get in return lovely toys of the animals you adopt and a set of booklets and fact sheets that have loads of fascinating information about the different animals. You also get bookmarks and stickers which kids (and adults?) will love!
In addition a great gift for kids that really helps raise their awareness in them of the importance of conservation is WWF’s Go Wild Kid’s Club. included in this are wristbands, a bag, a members certificate, explorer's booklet, six animal guides and more. Polar bear adoption is included!
Here’s a link so you can see all the animal adoptions we have on our site.
The National Trust
This is a massively popular and well known UK conservation charity that looks after lots of natural wild sites and ancient buildings and properties. Millions of people each year visit the sites and there are special benefits to becoming a member of the National Trust as you get great savings on entry costs. Lots of people like to take out National Trust Gift Memberships for their friends as they make for a lovely gift. If you know someone who loves to be out and about appreciating the best of what the UK has to offier from a natural and historical perspective then do consider joining. You can learn more about membership here.
As well as memberships the National Trust have a wonderful shop of products that we love and we think you will too. Prices start from just £2 and they’ve got all sorts of things from books to extensive home and garden products. If your order is more than £50 - then delivery is free - check out the shop!
The Woodland Trust
This is another UK conservation charity, concerned with the protection and conservation of the UK’s wonderful ancient woods and forests.
They too have an awesome online shop that sells all sorts of cool and ethically sourced products from homeware, to books to puzzles. You can even dedicate a tree.
This time you can get free delivery for any order over £35 which we think is a great deal.
Like the National Trust you can also join Woodland Trust at a very affordable price of just £2.75 a month.
Discover more about their shop here and Woodland Trust membership here
Present Aid (from Christian Aid)
Now we jump from conservation country to a charity that helps fight poverty the world over. Present Aid.
They have more than thirty cool and very different gift ideas! When people order a gift from Present Aid, the money is invested in projects that work with people in poor communities to help improve their lives.
The projects that gift sales help to fund include farming, health, education and clean water.
If you like to support charities that work in international development, then please learn more about Present Aid here.
