Freecycle

In some areas, Freecycle is a well know and used part of life. It others, it is just building steam.

When I moved out of S.F., I used Freecycle to give away a ton of stuff. Yes, I said "give away"! Freecycle is all about keeping reusable things out of the landfills by finding others that need them.

Their mission statement, "Our mission is to build a worldwide gifting movement that reduces waste, saves precious resources & eases the burden on our landfills while enabling our members to benefit from the strength of a larger community."

Here's how it works. Those who have things to get rid of post them on their local Yahoo message board. Other members who want to take these items respond and arrange a pick-up. Also, anyone can post a 'wanted' notice, letting other members know of an item they are looking for. Any member who has a wanted item can make contact and arrange to give their item away.

It's all free, so stuff goes pretty quickly. I gave away kid's toys, Halloween decorations, old fish tanks and tools, to name a few. Multiple people contacted me for every item I listed!

Freecycle is a great way to lighten your load in a move, or just clean out your garage. With the holiday season coming up, now is a great time to give it a try. Give others a chance to reduce their holiday spending by making use of your unwanted items. Find that perfect gift for your hard to shop for Aunt Hildy. Make room in your garage for that new bobsled! Save costly and time consuming trips to the dump after you clean out your massively over-packed warehouse (you know who you are ;)

http://www.freecycle.org/