FurniHelp Mid Susses - help for those in need

When you sit down on your sofa, sleep in your bed or turn on your cooker, it’s probably hard to imagine life without these basic home comforts. Yet, if you were a young parent struggling on the breadline or a recently homeless person with no ready cash, you could easily find yourself lacking these barest of necessities. These issues prompted the birth of FurniHelp back in 1995, a charity which was one of the first in the UK working in this field.

FurniHelp acts solely on referrals from housing providers, social workers and health professionals, so we are certain that all recipients are in genuine need. Over the years we have helped victims of domestic abuse, recovering substance users, single parents, young families and elderly people who have all benefitted from enough decent quality, free goods to set up a real home for themselves.

Advertising and TV makeover shows encourage people to fling out loads of redundant furniture with perfectly useable items being driven to the rubbish dump. At the same time people in the same town may be unable to afford the basics and must make do with sleeping and sitting on the floor. Avoiding this wastage is central to the ethos of FurniHelp. 90% of donations are recycled and stay out of landfill. Despite the appearances of prosperity there are pockets of poverty every bit as bad as anywhere else in the UK and that isn’t going to change anytime soon.

The difficult economic climate has seen a drop in donations and yet more people than ever are in real need especially of beds, sofas and white goods such as cookers and washing machines (sadly, for technical reasons, we can no longer accept fridges and freezers). We try to provide help within two weeks but as demand increases, we have difficulty in keeping up due to the shortage of volunteers. It may not be generally known but most social housing comes as a virtually empty box and many people really do have nothing, a concept that is difficult to fully grasp if you already have a furnished and equipped home.

In an average year, FurniHelp undertake around 400 collections and deliveries; our brightly logoed van can be seen on our roads usually once a week but with more voluntary help this could increase. Younger blood is needed to help, especially when it comes to drivers and loaders. Anyone who can spare a few hours to collect and deliver furniture would become part of the team and feel assured that they are helping provide essential help to those in the direst need.

Of course, the charity needs managing and three of our four current Trustees are increasingly feeling the effects of anno domini. We urgently need to refresh the Trustee team to enable Furnihelp to continue to thrive in the future.

We welcome expressions of interest and can be reached on 01342 811755 or at [email protected] . Join us for a coffee and a chat - it is a really worthwhile charity.