When Emma Spinelli found a long-lost key to a filing cabinet at the IW Chamber she was surprised to find it full of out-of-date pads of paper, pens and other promotional items that had been sent to the Island by the British Chamber for a campaign that was never planned to be launched down here. At the time the items were stored for future use but that future use never materialised and the promotional items became a treasure lot to the annuls of time. The hoard totalled 250 A5 notepads and two very large boxes full of ballpoint pens.
“As a small team of less than ten we would never get through the pens and pads of paper in a million years so I wanted to find them a suitable home rather than leave them gathering dust or, even worse, throw them out. We didn’t count the pens as there were so many but a conservative estimate would have been about 1000. I wanted to give them a new home at a local school that might be able to use them.” said Emma.
Barton Primary School is the closest to the IW Chamber offices and they were very happy that Emma contacted them with the offer.
Headteacher Mark Snow commented “Schools like ours are always delighted when the community and businesses want to get involved. We will definitely get great use out of the IW Chamber donation. It is also a great opportunity for us to let the students know who the IW Chamber are and what they do.”
Isle of Wight Chamber of Commerce CEO Steven Holbrook is very keen for the Chamber to play a leading role in supporting the local community and urges other business to do the same “These were items that we had been storing for a long time and we eventually decided that we weren’t going to get any use out of them. Donating them to a local school who could get some benefit from them seemed like the perfect idea. If any businesses on the Island find a long-lost cupboard of promotional items, ring-binders, pens, paper or any other treasure – why not reach out to a local school? I’m sure they would welcome the call!”
