SPF Final Report: Campus Swaps
Shira Abramowitz & Christian D’Andrea
Initiation
The intention of the Campus Swaps program was to create a circular system of ownership within
the McGill community- to connect incoming and outgoing students in a fashion that dealt with
the time gap between students leaving and students entering McGill. It was noticed that a great
deal of perfectly functional goods were trashed every spring as graduating students rushed to
move out of their apartments and Montreal in order to enter the next chapter of their lives.
New student
Buys “stuff”
Graduates
& moves out
“Stuff”
becomes
trash
Ends up in a
landfill
First-year students and students moving into apartments for the first time were in need of
household supplies in the fall and had to resort to spending a great deal of money at big box
stores for furnishings. By connecting these two groups, we believed we could divert thousands of
items from landfills and provide students with affordable and sustainable methods of purchasing
everyday household items.
Process
New student
3. Fall Sales
Event
Graduates &
moves out
1. Free Pickup
Service
collects
“stuff”
2. Summer
storage
In April of 2011, plans for the Campus Swaps collection event took shape. We divided the
project into two sections: collection and sales. Of these two sections, we further divided the
process into logistics and advertisement.
An SUV was arranged to be in Montreal for the collection days and one of the co-founder’s
apartments was designated a sorting and storage space. Ads were posted using various media
formats, including Facebook, posters, Twitter, University List-serves, a website and an ad in the
McGill Tribune. Students were able to book appointments through one of the co-founders, which
were scheduled for Aril 30th and May 1st. These days were chosen, because they were the days
students would be preparing to move/moving. These two fifteen-hour work days were spent
collecting items from students and transporting them to the sorting location. Over the following
weeks, the items were sorted, some were cleaned, and all were packaged to be stored over the
summer.
Over the summer, a sales location was found on campus (in the SSMU building), and a new ad
campaign was designed specifically for incoming students. Similar methods were used to
promote the sales days; however, we also had the support of the First Year Office, which gave us
a table at the Parents Tent on Lower Field where we could speak directly with parents who were
actively learning about other facets of McGill and the services available to their children. Other
additional media was a promotional video about Campus Swaps which was created by a friend,
as well as improved poster designs that were printed at Staples. We were hoping to use the
Engineering Undergraduate Society print services as we did in the spring; however they were not
open in August.
The day before the sale began; we rented a 17’ UHaul truck to transport the goods from the
storage space to the SSMU building. We were careful to adhere to the delivery rules, as
McTavish Street is a pedestrian walk and only allows deliveries before 11am. Four individuals
were involved in moving the boxed goods into the appropriate room of the SSMU building and
unpacking them for the sale.
The sale lasted three days: August 26-28. We opened from 10am-6pm and restocked/cleaned for
about an hour after each close. On average three volunteers were on location at any one time to
assist customers, clean, sort, and perform transactions.
After the close of the final sales day, we spent two hours repacking the unsold items back into
boxes. The next morning, we rented another 17’ UHaul truck and two of us transported and
donated the goods to The SWAP Team (a local non-profit organisation) and Renaissance.
Everything was accepted by the two organisations.
What Worked
The project was a success. We managed to collect and divert over 4000 pounds of stuff from
landfills. Approximately 60% of what was collected was sold to students and the remainder was
donated to local non-profit organisations and charities. The collection service proved to be
hectic, but manageable as bookings were well organized. The success of our marketing
techniques will be elucidated by a marketing analysis being performed by current marketing
students in the Desautels Faculty of Management; however, from casual conversations with
students it seems that the strongest methods of promotion were the free ones: social media and
word of mouth.
The transportation and sales event were also largely successful. The sale space was appropriate
in size and location, being conveniently close to both students and the Parents Tent. There were
no issues with the rentals of the UHaul trucks. They were perfectly sized and well-priced for our
needs. The only difficulty was adapting to driving such a large vehicle. The post-sale donations
went better than expected. Both the SWAP Team and Renaissance accepted everything we gave
them. We were literally left with nothing after the drop-offs.
What Didn’t Work
Although everything was successful, there were areas of the operation which were difficult and
could benefit from restructuring. The use of the SUV was much more laborious than the UHaul
as more trips were needed to transport the same items and acquiring the SUV took more effort
than simply renting the UHaul. The overall cost of renting the UHaul was also less expensive
than using the SUV as it had to be brought to Montreal from out of town.
There were room booking issues with the SSMU which proved to be quite stressful and potential
damaging to the sales expo. We had thought that confirming the room bookings through the VP
Internal was the appropriate route to take, however, this led to a double booking and almost
interfered with the entire sales exposition. It turns out that booking through the person who
directly signs out the rooms would prevent any confusion in the future.
During our marketing campaigns, we used many different methods of promoting Campus Swaps.
We found the free methods to work best (Facebook, word of mouth, listserves). We did purchase
an ad in the McGill Tribune for $50, but we found that it was not an efficient method of
advertising the collection service or the sales exposition.
What We Learned
This first year of running Campus Swaps taught us a great deal about the work involved in
planning and implementing a large-scale event and service for the McGill community. We
learned how to work with the McGill staff to obtain permission and organize a successful event.
We now know many of the proper channels to go through when searching for information or
approval for various aspects of the Campus Swaps service. This will make future Campus Swaps
events much easier to organize as the proper paths are no longer those less travelled.
We learned that the Campus Swaps is an intensely laborious service and is in need of volunteers
during the collection and sales days. We are working on an appropriate way to deal with this
need. This year we were fortunate enough to have friends assisting with some of the moving and
running the sale. However, this is not a reliable source of volunteers so we are working on
making agreements with student groups for the upcoming year.
What Is Transferable
Today, the business world is rapidly transforming as more and more companies are created that
transcend the traditional for-profit business approach. Social enterprise is a manifestation of a
greater movement toward responsible business practices which promote social and
environmental well-being, while maintaining a sustainable financial model.
Campus Swaps offers an opportunity for individuals to experience running a business in their
local community while providing a valuable service to their peers. They will encounter the
blessings and challenges of being one’s own boss and having the responsibility to manage their
affairs independently. Centred on social impact, individuals will learn to embody the social
enterprise mentality to benefit themselves, their community and the environment as a whole.
Future Vision/Objectives
Campus Swaps is a for-profit business, however, because we have designed it as a social
enterprise, we are not so much concerned with making a profit as we are with the service being
sustainable. This of course does mean that the business will have to be profitable; however,
margins can remain relatively low, which will allow us to maximize the savings to students and
employment opportunities for Regional Managers.
There is clearly a market for the service we are providing. We have seen and heard of interest
from a great deal of students, both in regards to the free pickup service and the sales exposition.
We are confident this market is large and that we have only tapped into a small fraction of it.
This year has been successful; however we are working on ways to make it more feasible,
especially when the Co-founders will no longer be in Montreal to run the service. We are
currently developing the model for our future structure, but we are planning on hiring Regional
Managers to run the events at their respective universities. Campus Swaps administration will be
in charge of providing supportive information (ie: contacts, paperwork, mentorship) and
promotional materials, as well as assistance with the planning process of the collections and
services. Regional Managers will be responsible for organizing logistics of the services, finding
volunteers and actually running the services in the spring and fall.
We are hoping that the finalized structure will be a sustainable one which can be easily
implemented at other universities (with customization, of course). This year we are planning two
new pilot projects; one at Concordia University and the other at the California State University,
San José. If these prove to be successful, we will start approaching other universities in Canada
and the USA. Ideally, all universities will have a Campus Swaps service running on an annual
basis. We believe that our service is uniquely designed and offers a wonderful benefit to
students, their university communities and the environment through a free and convenient
service, affordably priced goods and a measurable positive environmental impact.