Are you joining the thousands of Aussies hitting the Garage Sale Trail on Saturday? With almost 7000 sales registered and over 2 million dollars worth of stuff up for sale, it is sure to be an awesome community day.

If you’ve had a good clean out in preparation for a sale, I’m sure you have rediscovered some idle assets. So now that you can actually see them in the shed why don’t snap a few pictures and get them up on Open Shed!

Need some help? Check out Bek’s guide to listing here

Listing your stuff on Open Shed can be a great way to keep Saturday’s neighbourhood spirit alive all year round.

If you already have your stuff up on Open Shed why don’t you print off some personalised flyers and spread the word about your listings as you mosey around your local trail.

So what are your picks for tomorrow? Where are you heading?

A couple of our friends are having sales, so if you are in the area you should head along to:

• All Hail the Chelsea Garage Sale - there will be a big selection of donated goods - something for everyone. It will be on rain or shine and all proceedings will go to Chelsea Community Occasional Childcare. If you see I Love to Op Shop there volunteering, say hi from Open Shed

• The Sharehood is also hosting three sales around Melbourne - Reservoir, Northcote, Carlton

Have fun getting your haggle on!

We would love for you to share your trail stories and bargains here and on Facebook - go on, take the opportunity to brag about the bargains you bagged!

A couple of weeks ago we road tripped it down from Hervey Bay to Melbourne to start a new house sit. Now a 24 hour drive really doesn’t sound that fun, but Duncan and I have pretty much got this travelling between house sits business down pat!

To make the trip as enjoyable as possible we always have an audio book ready to go - on the way up to Hervey Bay it was the Steve Job’s biography and on the way back down it was the first two books of the Hunger Games trilogy. And of course we didn’t do the drive in one go, we took the opportunity to catch up with old uni friends, family and put faces to names of a couple of Aussie collcons businesses.

Just after Brisbane we made a slight detour into the gorgeous Lennox Heads to meet Michelle Shearer, founder of MamaBake, “the home of group, big batch cooking”. Michelle and I had chatted on email, Facebook and twitter, but we hadn’t actually met in person! Duncan, Michelle and I had a great chat, some of which I filmed and will be up on Open Shed TV shortly.

While in Sydney Adam Haeger, the co founder of Quiverizer “the world’s first surfboard swapping site” invited us to catch up with him at Fishburners, where they are now firmly ensconced after being selected for PushStart’s startup accelerator

I also grabbed a coffee with Tia Saunders, co founder of Zookal , a textbook rental site, which is going great guns and was recently included in BRW’s 10 startups to watch!

I love catching up with others in a similar space to us - it is so useful to discuss how our respective businesses are going, our challenges, what’s worked, what hadn’t and of course, I just love a chat with other cool, passionate people!

While in Melbourne I’ll be taking the opportunity to have a couple more of these inspiring chats, given its the home of Buy Nothing New Month, Meemeep, We Teach Me, Eat with Me, Eaterprises, Swap, Shuffle and Share, Sharehood, A City with Quirk and Ziilch

In December last year I went along to the fabulous 1 Million Women SAVE Summit in Sydney, which launched their 2012 SAVE campaign. Over the next 6 months 1MW want to assist you to SAVE $1000 or more through cutting pollution, reducing waste and saving energy. Each month focuses on a different lifestyle area - FOOD, DRIVE, POWER, WEAR, SHOP & INVEST.

We think its an awesome practical campaign and we want to help too! So we have asked some of our friends to also give their tips each month. This month’s focus is FOOD and we thought it was a perfect opportunity to introduce you to the fabulous Natasha from the new site for food gardeners Swap, Shuffle and Share…

It’s a warm Spring Saturday morning and I’ve decided that it’s time to move the existing veggie garden beds to prepare for the master plan - which involves more veggie garden beds, but in a different location. So I get to work harvesting and removing the plants in the existing beds. I grab a couple of tubs which are soon full of silverbeet, spring onions, and celery. Lots of celery. I realise that I’m not quite sure why I grew so much celery to begin with. I think it had to do with purchasing a punnet of seedlings and not realising how many were in there, and having the spare space, I planted them all. Because that’s what you do.

So now I have tubs full of produce and even after giving as much as I can away to friends and family, I still have plenty left over. What other way was there to get the message out? Here was fresh produce, ready for someone to enjoy and I wanted to share it.

How can I tell someone where I am, and what I have to share? How can I reduce the waste of too much excess produce ending up on the compost heap? How do I connect with people around me feeling the same way?

I researched online and found food swaps through social media, websites and online gardening forums. I joined the local permaculture group. But communication was fragmented and it was frustrating that there wasn’t a single place that food gardeners could call ‘home’.

I started mapping out what I wanted in a site for food gardeners and what I would need to do to get it online. Having worked alongside many businesses to build their websites in my role of Director of a graphic design studio, I was able to utilise existing contacts and get some great feedback on what would make a great site for food gardeners.

Swap Shuffle Share was built around an online forum that allows members to sign up and create or join groups that are local to them, or members who share an interest. This is where most of the activity takes place with members sharing their produce, ideas, experience and inspiration. The site features a resource section with informative articles and delicious recipes submitted by members. A directory is also online with listings of businesses, food swaps, local markets, jobs available and positions wanted, and items of sale, swap, exchange, or free.

As the site grows Swap Shuffle Share will become a valuable resource and essential destination for the food gardeners across Australia.

So now I don’t have tubs of celery - if I have too many seedlings in a punnet I will plant the extra into small pots to take to the next food swap. If I do have too much, I harvest it and share it with neighbours or post a call out to my Swap Shuffle Share group to let them know it’s available. And what I get in return is a sense of community, the knowledge that someone is enjoying my home grown produce, and a basket full of fresh produce from a fellow gardener that helps fill the gaps of what I don’t have in my garden. I am hoping that all food gardeners can do the same. Membership to our website is free.

Start a conversation at www.swapshuffheshare.com today.

About the author: Natasha Kuperman is the founder of Swap, Shuffle and Share and a keen novice food gardener with an unruly backyard that is slowly being transformed into a productive garden!

You can also connect with Swap, Shuffle and Share on facebook and twitter

Our friends at SpaceOut chat about collaborative consumption and how you can make money from thin air! Check them out before the end of January and you can try them for free for 2 months.

Despite all the gloomy news in the world, one shining star of the modern era is the worldwide Collaborative Consumption movement, and if you are reading this you may already be an active participant, or at least, interested in learning a bit more about it.

As a business owner in this innovative field, I am very proud to be involved, and urge all Aussies to take a participative role in this grassroots movement towards a more local and less ‘greedy’ model of consumption. And in my opinion, one of the best benefits is that money and goods get cycled at the community level. This keeps money and resources in the community, and not continuously funnelled towards the big corporations - which are not necessarily evil, but do tend to end up with lots of (our) cash!

SpaceOut was an early starter within the Collaborative Consumption movement (running since 2009) and what we do is match up people with unused space in their home or business with people who need space, but don’t want to pay commercial rates. Both sides get to benefit, and all transactions stay at the community level.

SpaceOut was set up originally to provide an alternative option for people looking for storage space, but as a result of demand from our members, quickly expanded to include parking space, office space, commercial space and pretty much any type of space you can imagine.

Collaborative Consumption is aimed at smart living in difficult times. It relies on people like you helping to spread the message. Please take a moment to think of who you know who may be able to participate. Whoever it is - the community wins every time!

About the Author: Damon Russell - one of the original founders of SpaceOut - came up with the concept of “Private Storage” when moving to Japan, and looking for somewhere in Australia to store his gear for an extended period but at reasonable cost

As we head into a new school year, Bern Alexander from FindAUniform shares with us the benefits of secondhand uniforms

The majority of Australia’s 11,000+ schools and more than 30,000+ organisations, clubs and academies have compulsory uniforms and equipment. Anecdotally, the question ‘Do you have secondhand uniforms?’ rates consistently in the top three questions that new enquirers or joiners ask a school, club, organisation, or academy. So why then do only approximately 30% of the schools, clubs, and academies provide their members with a secondhand uniform option?

Secondhand uniforms are perfect for:

• Saving money – expect to pay 20 -70% of the Recommended Retail Price

• Saving tax – secondhand uniforms can be a tax deduction governed by the rules of the Education Tax Refund

• Re-selling - with the average life of a garment estimated to be 3 years (which equates to 12 school terms and use by 3-4 kids), second hand uniforms can be re-sold to assist with ongoing school and activities costs and uniform needs.

• Reducing landfill and textile waste

• Enabling each child to be in the right uniform at an affordable cost

• Meeting and collaborating with people in your own and wider community

Based on a UK example, if everyone bought one reclaimed woollen garment each year, it would save an average of 371 million gallons of water (the average UK reservoir holds about 300 million gallons) and 480 tonnes of chemical dyestuffs.

Can you just imagine the impact for Australian landfill and textile waste if the members of our 40,000+ schools and organisations thought of purchasing secondhand uniforms as the norm? Talk about an easy way to green your School or Organisation.

Secondhand uniforms – why not? There really is no excuse. There are a number of ways you can create your own second hand uniform options or utilise what already exists – here are some ideas:

• a noticeboard for people to pin up their for sale and wanted ads
• providing space in newsletters for the sale of secondhand uniforms
• creation of a Facebook, or the like, site just for your Organisation’s second hand uniforms
• utilising online peer-to-peer online noticeboards (eg www.findauniform.com.au)
• providing listings on School or Organisations website
• facilitating regular swap or clothing exchange days at the change of seasons
• formation of a uniform shop – whether professional or volunteer run and charging commissions for sales or just accepting clothing donations
• Schools rent out expensive uniforms that are only used occasionally- for example, blazers needed for band performances (eg www.openshed.com)

Secondhand uniforms just make sense – so as we head into the new school year , sports season and take up activities requiring uniforms and equipment –encourage uniform affordability and landfill reduction by looking to purchase secondhand uniforms and by daring to ask your School and Organisations “Secondhand uniforms? Why not?”

*_About the author:* Bern Alexander is the Founder and Director of “FindAUniform”:find. She has four kids under 12 and knows the high cost of school/activities and the current adhoc availability of secondhand uniforms._

FindAUniform is your second-hand uniform online Peer2Peer noticeboard. FindAUniform’s mission is to make second hand uniforms as available as wearing uniforms are compulsory. Can you help spread the word?

You can connect with Bern and FindAUniform on twitter or facebook

I’m really passionate about sharing all the ways that exist for Australians to get involved with the Collaborative Consumption movement. Since Open Shed went live I have had a number of opportunities to spread the word. So if you want some ideas about how you can get involved, check these out:

• Ignite Sydney, 11 October 2011.

Here is the slide version of my presentation, a video of the night will be available in the future. For those of you new to Ignite, the premise is you have strictly 5 minutes, 20 slides which rotate automatically after 15 seconds.

• The Old Becomes New - Business Chicks, 25 October 2011 Sharing, swapping, renting and bartering are cool again! Technology is enabling these old behaviours and we are experiencing a Collaborative Consumption revolution!

• Chatting with Carol Duncan from ABC Newcastle, 31 October 2011: Collaborative Consumption - sharing our way to sustainability

What’s your favourite example of collaborative consumption? Besides Open Shed of course :-)

Open Shed met our friends The Clothing Exchange via PlanBig and we are super excited that the second annual National Swap Day (17 October 2011) was another fabulous success!

We are delighted to pronounce this year’s National Swap Day to be a huge success. We had over 250 swappers across 4 states swapping simultaneously to raise the profile of swapping in the place of wasteful shopping. It was a celebration for green fashionistas who enjoyed the social, ecological and economic benefits of reinventing their wardrobes in this way.

Our partners Australian Red Cross had a ball handing out cake and chatting about doing good. There were many donations made to their Karma Bin that will go on to raise money to support the vulnerable communities that Australia Red Cross assist.

We had a fantastic line up of savvy swappers wearing their favourite pre-swapped outfit in return for a free ticket to the event. This gorgeous picture (above) showcases the treasures to be found at the clothing exchange and the smile that comes from a satisfying find. We were also inundated with cameras from keen bloggers, a Channel ten film crew and Triple J Radio so we look forward to these media appearances spreading the swapping word far and wide, long after the night is over.

Big thanks to all of the generous souls who contributed to this event, particularly our sponsors Australian Red Cross, Plan Big, Oxfam & 3things, Fitted for Work, Ethical Clothing Australia, Frankie Magazine, Buro North and all the delightful Clothing Exchange volunteers!

The Clothing Exchange Team

Last swaps for the year:

Melbourne: When: Monday 28th November Where: BMW Edge, Federation Square Time: 6.30pm

Sydney: When: Wednesday 7th of December Where: The Clock Hotel, 470 Crown St, Surry Hills Time: 6.30pm check-in for a 7.30pm swap

I know you’ve been thinking… ok, so they have had an online business idea, quit their jobs, started house sitting, created a card wall BUT what exactly are they up to??

Drum roll please…

Foxhound Developers is joining the collaborative consumption revolution! Duncan and I are developing a website that will help people lend their stuff, or rent other peoples stuff. You know what I’m talking about, that stuff that is lying idle in backyard sheds and spare bedrooms: power drills, lawn mowers, tents, sporting equipment - the list is endless.

It is estimated that every year Australians buy $10.8 billion worth of “stuff” they will never use - that’s an average of $1,250 worth of stuff lying idle in every Australian home! That “stuff” is a waste of money, takes up space and is not particularly environmentally friendly. Our site will offer Australians the opportunity to save and make money while living a sustainable and community minded life. Our site will help you to:

• lend out your rarely used stuff to other people near you. Make money lending out your power drill (how often do you really use it?) rather than just having it gather dust in your shed.
• experience things you might not otherwise experience - you don’t need to own “stuff” to experience it. Why don’t you borrow that kayak for the weekend and give kayaking a go!
• try before you buy. We hope people will put their iPads, Kindles and Digital Cameras on the site and give others the opportunity to rent them for a couple of days, have a play and see whether it really is what they need before they buy.
• build new or strengthen existing community connections.

This idea developed out of one of my favourite TED talks - The Case for Collaborative Consumption by Rachel Botsman - which you can watch here.

After listening to the talk I read Rachel’s book (written with Roo Rodgers) What’s Mine is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption, and started researching collaborative consumption and peer-to-peer businesses in Australia. From there the idea just kept on turning over in my mind, until I had a business model that both Duncan and I really liked.

So in a nutshell that is what we are up to!

In future posts I will tell you all about how the site will work, planned features etc. I will also be writing here about the growing Australian collaborative consumption marketplace and sharing with you other cool opportunities out there to be living a more sustainable and community minded life.

I’ll also keep you updated with how the start up lifestyle is treating Duncan and I!

What do you think? Got any advice/ suggestions / feedback you would like to share?