Heatons Cats Blog: September 30th
We’ve had a facelift!
At Heaton’s Cats we’re always busy but this year we’ve undertaken some
additional challenges to hopefully help ensure the future of the charity going
forward.
If you’ve visited the shop in the last few weeks, you will have noticed that it looks
a little different. That’s because we had to do some essential works on the
electrics and flooring to ensure it continued to be safe and sound. Whilst this
work was being done, we decided it was the perfect opportunity to give the place
a bit of a freshen up which meant that over the school holidays, we closed the
shop for 6 whole weeks.
The cat care is always, first and foremost, our number one priority which means
all the charity funds raised are typically needed for vets bills and food etc. So
when it came to do some repairs and decorating in the shop, we reached out to
businesses in our local community and they did not disappoint!
We managed to find some brilliant local trades including the following;
Connor at Casey Plastering Services who generously donated their time
and labour to provide us with a much-needed fresh coat of plaster.
Jason at JSA Flooring who moved things around in his schedule to fit us in
very last minute in his busy summer schedule to supply and fit a
replacement floor.
George from GMR Electrical for installing our new, up-to-code lighting in
the shop.
Craig from North Electrical Energy & Gas who helped us out with new
electric sockets, shop wiring and worked alongside
Tony Williamson Joinery & Maintenance who worked with our team
throughout to fix, fit and build anything that was needed, Tony was our
man!
We also received incredible donations of paint and decorating materials from
Dulux Decorating Centre Stockport, Brewers Decorating Centre Stockport and
Johnstones Decorating Centre Stockport which meant that our volunteers were
able to decorate the whole shop area with zero material cost, making a huge
difference to the budget!
In addition to this, the project was led and managed by an existing volunteer
who liaised with all of the above companies, designed the new space and
sourced all of the materials, including the shop fixtures and fittings.
Staying true to our roots as a charity thrift shop, everything was either
repurposed from the shop or sourced second-hand, including lots of kindly
gifted items from local residents such as shelving, wardrobes, rails, tables,
dressers and more!
We gave it all a clean down and a lick of paint where needed and repurposed it
to what you now see.
The shop is now a breath of fresh air and has a whole new lease of life to
hopefully keep generating much-needed funds so we can continue to care for
and rehome stray cats and kittens long into the future.
What Next?
Closing the shop for 6 weeks was a huge undertaking and required a lot of work
but we couldn’t have imagined how good it all now looks.
If you live in the local area please do pop in and have a browse, we have great
donations coming in all of the time and now the shop has reopened, we need to
spread the word to encourage people to come and see for themselves.
We’re continuing to take in donations of clothing, toys, homewares etc when we
have storage space available so please do keep us in mind when you’re having a
clear out at home!
We’ve also extended the shop opening hours to include Sunday and Monday
afternoons and are currently looking for new volunteers to join the team – see
below for more info.
Closing the shop for 6 weeks was a huge undertaking and required a lot of work
but we couldn’t have imagined how good it all now looks, the customer feedback
has been incredible – boutique-style shopping and charity shop prices, what’s
not to love?!
How can you help?
The charity relies heavily upon the kindness and generosity of our
volunteers, in cat care, the charity shop and fundraising at our events. We
are currently looking for some new volunteers to join the team to help
staff our lovely new shop in Heaton Chapel. If you’re great with people
and have customer service skills with a few hours to spare each week, we’d love to hear from you. Drop us an email or pop into the shop to leave your details.
By donating a small amount to help towards our vet bills (Bank is RBS,
The Heatons Animal Rescue Group s/c 16-21-17 account 10029815) or
by Paypal heatonscats@gmail.com. (see the link on our homepage)
By donating good quality clothing, shoes, bags, toys and homewares.
By donating a small amount of cat food to help keep our rescues fed.
Or simply by sharing our Social Media posts so as many people as
possible are aware of what we do.
We’ll be back in touch soon to give you a much-needed update on cats and
kittens as well as everything else that’s been going on!
heatonscats@gmail.com
0161 975 0784
Shop Hours: Mon 12.00-3.45pm Tues-Saturday 10.30-3.45pm Sun 12.00-3pm