A Circle Back

Aim

A pop-up shop and online marketplace promoting & selling design-led, ethical, sustainable & eco-friendly brands in one place.

A Circle Back.  A place to promote great gifting, thoughtful treats, positive presents, brands with a backbone and spending on sustainability. Goodness which circles back.

For the first time we're looking to create A Circle Back: Pop-Up shop. The shop will be in London and coincide with the launch of an online shop on the existing website too. Contributions will enable us to launch the website into a marketplace and enable A Circle Back to become a pop-up bricks and mortar shop. 

It will in turn increase business for brilliant small brands with big hearts! From brands that give percentages of their profits to charity, to brands that champion fair-trade and production. All brands have been chosen for their product and also their ethos. 

• Great brands can exist in one centralised space to boost exposure and commerce. 
• Consumers can shop multiple brands from one place without wasting money and resources paying for multiple shipments. 
• More people can discover great small businesses which support fantastic causes. 
• You'll help evolve A Circle Back from a click-thru site to a business. 
• By contributing you'll be championing, and recognising, these businesses of the future and you will be supporting the start of a consumerist movement that matters. 

By curating brands which have similar ethos in one space we hope to encourage positive purchasing and promote thoughtful spending. We endeavour to support the brilliant business models. 

• After a successful launch I want to continue to develop new points of sale in London and Brighton. 
• Brands stocked on the website after the first pop-up will pay 10% percentage commission for any sales through A Circle Back. 
• From this percentage,  5% will go back into the business and 5% will go to one of the three chosen charities A Circle Back is supporting. 
• I will also be developing a line of A Circle Back items, in collaboration with artists, to generate more money for the project and charities. 25% of profits from these pieces will also go to one of the three charities, chosen by the customer. 
• Each year the charities will be under three headings, People, Planet and Progress. 
  • People: will be charities which directly contribute to health, education or the well-being of humans.
  • Planet: will be charities which help to protect, preserve and sustain our planet and eco-systems.
  • Progress: will be charities which support the development of sustainable practises, education, new manufacturing, scientific endeavours. 
• As a customer, you can chose where the extra percentages go. You buy, you chose, we give. 

• There's plenty of excess in the world and thoughtless product, I think it's time to give a voice to the brands creating things thoughtfully and also show that these products are good quality, fit a modern lifestyle and are beautiful in their own right. 
• I love to give gifts to my immediate circle and there will always be occasions to do so. If you can find things that also contribute to a wider circle, the meaning of the gift is deeper. 
• “When the gift moves in a circle its motion is beyond the control of the personal ego, and so each bearer must be a part of the group and each donation is an act of social faith.” - Lewis Hyde, The Gift

• Website: A click-thru website detailing brands under  5 categories: FASHION, LIFESTYLE, KIDS, JEWELLERY, BEAUTY - www.acircleback.com
• Instagram: A place where brands are discovered, promoted and a place of inspiring circular visual fodder #acirclebackinspiration - @acircleback
• Facebook: Another outlet on social media promoting products and engaging with the consumer - A Circle Back Facebook
• Twitter: Another place to advocate the project, gain consumers and cultivate interest - @acircleback
• Founder: Me! A passionate and motivated individual who has driven the project this far in 6 months and is looking to do even more by the end of the year! I am committed to doing all I can to make A Circle Back a success and have managed to achieve everything so far alongside working full time. It's more than just a personal passion but a project that I think should exist. I'm under no illusion that it will take a lot of work but with your support will give it my all to make it grow.  Read more about the project and my influences here: Goodness, Which Circles Back. An Interview with: Melissa Bowden

7 Day Pop-Up Rental London: £1750 (£250 per day)

Ecommerce Platform: £500 - 800 to create an online market place for brands. Dependent on how much money is raised will impact the platform and also how we shoot products and present them.  The money would enable: hiring necessary equipment for clear product shots, a more sophisticated transactional website with help from a developer and changing the current website to a business profile. 

Shop Fit: £200 for shop signage, vinyl transfers for windows, shelving, plants and tables. 

Digital Marketing - Social Platforms: £100-200 to push the website through promoted posts on facebook and instagram. 

Extra Funds: Any extra funds will go towards future pop-up funding, extra costs which have not been factored for, potential upfront purchasing of wholesale stock, promoting the concept and PR & Marketing, communicating ideas digitally. 

After the first pop-up I will provide a transparent report of how the money was spent, what causes were positively impacted through your support and also the business that was generated. I love a pie chart - they're circular after all! 

Through donating to A Circle Back's fund you can chose options to donate to charities at the same time. Chose from one of the below charities I've chosen to support. 

PEOPLE:

Marie Curie Cancer Care - providing care and support for people living with any terminal illness, and their families.  

Malala Fund - working for a world where every girl can learn and lead without fear. 

PLANET:

Rhino Ark - conservation and preservation of eco-systems, habitats, humans, wildlife and water sources in Kenya.  

Plastic Oceans-  working to change the way we deal with plastic waste by challenging society’s perception that this indestructible substance can be treated as ‘disposable’. 

PROGRESS:

In Kind Direct - distributes consumer goods donated by companies to UK charities working in the UK and overseas. Helping to ensure that everyone has access to life's essentials and that no usable product goes to waste. 

Think Global - learning for a just and sustainable world. 

Thank you,

Melissa x

This project successfully funded on 13th July 2018