Farewell Lil Refill (but not Lil!)

It’s with mixed emotions that we farewell the Lil Refill Shop. A mainstay of Lil’s outreach programmes, it’s been going since 2018. And now, Saturday 16th December will be our last day trading (We are offering 20% discount on bulk orders in the run up to closing the shop on the 16th Dec.) Lil of course will continue with our outreach programmes, like our Climate Hub, ReUse projects and more.

Lou: What a ride it has been! And none of it possible without you. Supporters, customers, occasional volunteers, regular volunteers, staff, donors, suppliers, delivery drivers, and some of you are a cross over of many of these! Across (FU) cancer, covid, and many, many spillages, And even more than the spillages, and plastic saved, has been a LOT of laughs. Looking back over the photos from early days has been rather emotional- not just the kids have grown, Sarah’s changing hair, but the supportive fellow trader, late Salt Pigs Jim, and so many supporters and partners that we won’t get to see so often as we do

Not sure what can top the day the duck visited - I wasn’t even there, but it made me laugh so much as autocorrect kept actually correcting when we WANTED to say “duck”. Lovely Greencity driver Val who now has the brother of Lou’s dog - and was the person we saw most in lockdown. And so many friends made. BBFS spillages. Thankfully Lil will still be here - so plenty more laughs and spills as we go, I’m sure.

Sarah: Wow, this is both a sad and liberating day! We have plans (well, would you expect anything less?) but I’m going to miss being part of the Haddy Massive - we have made so many friends from our base on the High Street and I know we will be seeing lots of you again (probably in the pub!) at events and activities going forward. I want to say a special thanks to Lou, for keeping the show on the road while I was crook and to Katie for giving it her best shot. The duck was happily released down by the river once I’d tempted her out! Other top memories? Impromptu back of shop fashion shows, emergency red wine, the race to the door to say ‘I’ll hold the puppy’ and too many laughs to count and so much love. x

Katie: I don’t think you feel fully part of the Lil Shop team until you’ve been baptised in fabric conditioner from being too busy chatting to customers while doing heir refills! But for me that sort of sums up the shop. Helpful, friendly and not afraid to get a bit messy in the process of serving customers! Not sure I can think of one stand out memory (sadly no ducks have visited since I started!) But I will miss my daily chats with customers doing their shopping rounds, all the new faces I’ve met in the past seven months, the lovely Lil volunteer who popped in to check I was going to be OK after the shop shuts (such a kind and caring community!) It has all been great fun.