Brighton and Hove Wood Recycling Project, aka The Wood Store, to close by the end of the year

Over the past 26 years, our employees, supported by local customers and dedicated volunteers, have saved thousands of tonnes of wood from landfill or incineration and helped train hundreds of disadvantaged people improving their employment and life outcomes. In recent years, like many other businesses in the area, the economic climate has not been kind to us. Covid, the Cost of Living Crisis and ongoing low consumer confidence have all taken their toll.

The charity’s main revenue stream from recycling construction timber by preventing it going to waste and selling it for reuse or making bespoke furniture has almost disappeared. Timber prices have increased considerably in recent years and the construction industry has become more mindful to minimise waste - a good thing for the environment but undermining our original business model which relied on this income. Although we believe this may pick up again in the future we do not have sufficient reserve funds to continue operations in the short-to-mid term.

In addition, like many charities we have always depended on council or private premises earmarked as future development for affordable sites to operate from. These have also become increasingly hard to find. Our ambition had been to grow revenue to a point where we could purchase a permanent site or at least afford the cost of commercial rent. Unfortunately, the past few years of economic uncertainty has made these ambitions impossible and our current sites are coming to the end of their lease agreements.

Over the past few months we’ve tried to boost income, and received generous support from funders and the public, but it’s not been enough to survive. The Board of Trustees have therefore taken the difficult decision to wind down the charity while we still have sufficient funds to ensure we meet all our final debts, especially payments to our loyal staff.

We are now reaching out to all our customers and supporters, the communities we have served, to please help us one last time:

○ come buy our reduced price timber; ○ place one final order for something we can make for you; ○ pay quickly if you owe us money; ○ make us an offer to purchase our tooling and vehicles; ○ volunteer to help us wrap the charity up;

All funds raised during the wind-down period will go to pay our creditors in line with charity commission regulations and to support our staff with redundancy. Thank you for your continued support and custom at this difficult time.