Why choose Smarter Uniforms?
It makes both financial and environmental sense to reuse uniforms. Clothes that are used for just nine months longer save valuable resources and money for parents. We believe services from Smarter Uniforms are now needed more than ever. We want to do our best to ensure dressing your children for school isn’t another strain on your pocket. Register on our online marketplace to sell your outgrown uniforms to other families in your community at a fraction of the price of new. With your help we can all bring more affordable uniforms to families across Brighton & Hove.
Making Uniforms More Affordable
The average parent spends £326 per child on school uniform including sports kit per year. This isn't cheap, especially if families have more than one child. Parents who want to source second-hand uniform know how difficult it is to find good quality items, especially at short notice after a rapid growth spurt.
“Great selection of uniforms at a brilliant price. Good to know it's helping the school and saving the planet too!” - Parent of a Cardinal Newman Catholic School student
A second-hand school uniform from the Smarter Uniforms marketplace has recommended pricing of 1/3 the price of brand new, with prices from just £0.50. Parents can select their own pricing too should they wish. Our aim is for people who use Smarter Uniforms to save money and to enjoy healthier family finances too.
Protect our planet's resources
We hate waste and love helping avoid it!
In the UK, £140 million of clothing is wasted and sent to landfill each year. That's 300,000 tonnes of clothes, many of which still have a lot of life in them. By buying second-hand uniform parents and carers can help save water and carbon, stop uniforms being wasted, and stop items being sent to landfill.
“Extending the life of clothes offers the greatest overall potential across carbon, water, and waste targets. This can be achieved by designing clothes to be more durable, and by encouraging re-use through sales of second-hand clothing.” SOURCE: Valuing Our Clothes: the Cost of UK Fashion Report, WRAP 2017.
All schools across Brighton and Hove can now be part of Smarter Uniforms so that together we can save even more water and carbon, prevent waste and save parents money. Each school has a listing on the marketplace that can be used by all parents and carers.
Help our local schools
Smarter Uniforms has fundraised more than £5,000 for local schools with revenue earned from uniform sales. We are redeveloping our work with schools currently and hope to develop templates that can be used by schools to run their own fundraising events and to educate students about clothing reuse benefits, with educational workshops about sustainability and textile supply chains.
We expect to launch these
Some amazing impacts
Thanks to school partners, volunteers and many helpful organisations across the city.
Smarter Uniforms have:
• Saved local parents over £110,000
• Saved more than 11,000 uniforms from landfill
• Raised £5,000 for local schools
Thank you
These amazing impacts are thanks to the wide community of parents and partners, alongside the Smarter Uniforms team. Every donation, purchase, partnership and volunteer helps to make school uniforms affordable for families and benefits our environment. Thank you all!
Find out more about our current partners and how you could get involved.