Let’s trade!

Just this morning, while having a quiet breakfast, our ears were suddenly jolted as we heard a blaring announcement going on outside.  So, what was it about? A vehicle was parked in front of our house, with a recorded woman’s voice trumpeting about trading old and damaged plastic pails, pots, pans, and all those household junkies with new ones. Huh? How could that be? Mom said it could be just exchanging many old items with just one new item. The announcement went on outside for the whole time we were having breakfast. Ugh… I don’t know if they managed to trade items with our neighbors though, I was just glad for the silence when they finally left. Noise pollution, anyone?

Anyway, exchanging of items is really a good idea. Some stuff you might not need or even want to throw away could be important or valuable to another. So, why not exchange it for something you’d like to have as well? You don’t have to go around the city trumpeting about it with a loudspeaker, just like what we got this morning, there’s a more decent and sensible way of doing it — you just go online and exchange your stuff at SwitchPlanet.com, where members can trade their old DVDs, CDs, books and other stuff with other members for free. They also have social tools like forums to help members communicate about their trades, and a SwitchFunds program to support various charities.

Switching or trading stuff at SwitchPlanet.com is facilitated via an internal currency called switchbucs. Members request items using switchbucs, and when you send your items, you immediately receive the switchbucs credited to your account which you can now use to request stuff you are interested in. To start, you just sign up for a free account, create your profile and list all items you own and would like to trade. A wish list is also provided where you can add things you want to have. The system then will let you know if some member wants something from your list, or if items on your wish list are available with another member. And then the switching begins!  This is SwitchPlanet’s concept about reusing the stuff we have by trading it with what we want and thus saving on money. As its tagline states, “Use more…waste less!”

Sponsored by SwitchPlanet.com