Sip + Swap

Have you ever contemplated hosting a clothing swap?? Well the idea popped into my head a few weeks ago and after running it by Andrea and a few other friends, we knew it would be an absolute blast!

We decided to call it a "Sip & Swap" since that allowed us to grab drinks and few other treats while we shopped through each other's clothes. It was a total hit and as everyone left, they felt like they had hit the jackpot with their newfound clothing items. Although there are about a bazillion different ways you can host a clothing swap, we absolutely loved how ours turned out so we will spill all the details with you!!

First things first, we made an invitation and sent it out to the ladies in our area who were interested. A lot of blogs stated that the best way to swap is to have only 6-8 people, but in my book I was totally fine with extra work as long as everyone was invited! We ended up having about 15 people come to the actual event. It was a lot of babes, but totally worth it!! Here is a look at the invitation we sent out...

We asked the ladies to drop off their gently used clothing/accessories to me throughout the week before so that we would have time to organize and arrange everything by Saturday. That way the ladies weren't walking into a crazy, chaotic mess when swap time came.

I believe one key to a successful swap is being on the same page as your girlfriends on what you are donating. Our goal for donations was cute/trendy items that just didn't get as much wear as they used to, or items that we liked but wanted to switch out for a different pattern/style. That way we weren't giving each other clothes that we thought were hideous, but more so giving our loved closet items that just weren't getting the use they deserved.

Andrea and I decided to set up the Friday before since we knew it would be a lot of work and a tad time consuming trying to get everything organized. We tried to organize items into sweaters, dresses, tees, accessories, belts, pants and skirts. We also tried to sub-organize each area by size so it would be easier on Saturday Morning.

We decided the fairest way to go about the swap was to give each person stickers with their initials on it, to put on items they wanted to take home. We made sure to correlate the number of stickers they received with the number of items they donated the week prior. This way we wouldn't have someone who donated a bunch of cute items only walk away with one thing and vice versa.

We realized that a lot of cute items would have multiple stickers on them. Because of this, we also organized a raffle system. After everyone had finished placing their stickers on their desired clothes, we grabbed the items with multiple names. We then went through and did a quick raffle to see who would get to go home with that item. The raffle took a bit of time since there were lots of items with multiple stickers, but it was totally worth it to ensure things were as fair as possible!

In the end, I walked out with 2 Banana Republic skirts, 1 top from The Loft, a pair of Kork Ease flats, and a cute pearl bracelet. I was absolutely stoked! Although I donated more items than this, I was so excited to walk away with 5 items that I actually loved!!

One part of this swap that I loved was the soda bar, it was perfect for the quick shoppers to be able to grab their drinks and relax as they waited for the raffle to begin. It was also fairly inexpensive to grab a couple drinks and treats!