Welcome welcome welcome!
The summer is coming to an end and you are probably soaking up those last morsels of sunshine before you head to uOttawa for the academic year. Now for some of you, this is going to be your first year and there is a good chance that you will live in residences. For others, this isn't your first rodeo and you are getting ready to move into a place off campus.
In either case, we have a handy guide for things you should and shouldn't pack on your way to campus this year. Thanks to the Free Store, your one stop shop on campus for all things FREE, there is a good chance that you won't have to waste valuable luggage space on these items.
This makes sense for your wallet and the environment.
Hangers
The Free Store has a virtually unlimited amount of hangers. How?Well a little known secret is that clothing stores have their products shipped to them with the hangers already added. It is cheaper to have workers add them at the factory or just before shipping than it is to have workers at retail clothing stores do it at North American wages.
So that means these stores have a glut of hangers that are too burdensome to send back and have no reason to be kept because more on on the way.
That's where the Free Store comes in. We collect hangers and distribute them to you. So if you need hangers, we have thousands of them... just hanging around.
Cups and bottles
Travel mugs and bottles are essential here. They are super handy since you get discounts everywhere you bring your own mug. Muggy Mondays offers free coffee if you bring a mug, every coffee shop offers a discount as well, and what's the point of having a toast of you don't have a mug to cheers with? uOttawa is also a bottled water free campus so the odds are you are going to want a bottle to fill up at the water fountains and hydration stations. Make sure to lug your mug.
Binders (well actually, basically all office supplies)
As the University of Ottawa moves towards becoming paperless, more and more binders are beginning to pop up. There is a good chance that you might do all your work on a laptop but if you don't, you are in for a treat... unlimited binders of every shape and size. And if you aren't in the market for binders, we have staplers, folders, paperclips, dividers, pencils, rulers, highlighters, etc...
Fiction
Sure I was just talking about going paperless, but sometimes nothing beats a good old fashioned book. At the Free Store we work with Textbooks for Change, a super awesome group that gives textbooks to African countries in need. But it turns out that they don't really need fiction novels. So if you are looking for some great stuff to read, trust me... university students have great taste and donate a lot of books.
Utensils
If you are living in one of the residences that has a meal plan, utensils might not be a thing you need. The Dining Hall is open 24/7 after all.But if you are living off-campus or just find comfort in having a spoon handy at any time, we have you covered. Piles of knives, forks, spoons, and even the occasional spork are yours for the taking.
Toilet paper and paper towels
I get that this sounds weird but trust me on this one. We have endless rolls of toilet paper and brown paper towels flooding the Free Store. There is a simple explanation about where it comes from. You see, every night when the washrooms are being cleaned out, there are usually a few rolls of toilet paper or brown paper that have been more than 50% used. We can't risk stranding people in a stall without any toilet paper so a new roll is added and the old rolls are brought to the Free Store.
Free toilet paper might not sound like the most exciting thing but think of what you could do with all the extra money.
So this list isn't comprehensive, it's really just a taste of the kinds of things you can find on campus. What we are really hoping for is that you will only bring the essentials. At the end of the year, our office collects over 10 tonnes on donations from students living in residences who don't need their stuff anymore.
In the end, it's all about making things easier for you. If we can help make your life better and do a little bit for the planet, isn't that what it's all about?
~jON - campus sustainability manager
Free toilet paper might not sound like the most exciting thing but think of what you could do with all the extra money.
So this list isn't comprehensive, it's really just a taste of the kinds of things you can find on campus. What we are really hoping for is that you will only bring the essentials. At the end of the year, our office collects over 10 tonnes on donations from students living in residences who don't need their stuff anymore.
In the end, it's all about making things easier for you. If we can help make your life better and do a little bit for the planet, isn't that what it's all about?
~jON - campus sustainability manager