This Bay Area pop-up store offers new, high-quality clothes, all for free, to help those in need

OAKLAND, Calif. - A sleek pop-up store in Oakland is offering high-quality clothing, shoes and other items with a focus on "casual and streetwear styles" all for free, in an ongoing mission to serve community members in need.

What we know:

It’s part of a new initiative by the Oakland-based Urban Compassion Project, known for its efforts to combat illegal dumping through its mass street and encampment clean-ups. 

With a force of some 5,000 volunteers behind it, the non-profit's wider objective is to support people experiencing financial and housing insecurities. 

Its new pilot program, called Compassion Threads, operates out of a previously vacant store located at 1420 Broadway in downtown Oakland.

Multipronged goal

Compassion Threads has a multipronged goal to provide free clothes while allowing those who benefit from the program to receive the giveaways in a dignified way. 

The inventory on its racks and shelves is purposefully not items that have been discarded or heavily worn. They're almost all brand new with the tags still on them. If not, they're like-new and very gently used. 

Simultaneously, the effort contributes to the goal of preventing waste, dumping and minimizing landfill use. 

On the project’s website, the non-profit described Compassion Threads as a pilot initiative "that extends our mutual aid efforts by redirecting high-quality clothing from landfills to individuals and families in need."

‘Activating’ the downtown space

The non-profit noted that furthermore, by occupying a downtown space that was previously vacant, the store has helped revitalize that area by bringing in foot traffic, benefiting other businesses in the vicinity. 

"We've kind of built this almost community space with this free clothing store that's now activating downtown Oakland. The entire block is lit up when we are open," Urban Compassion Project Executive Director Supriya Golas told KTVU.

It's been able to set up shop at that location, thanks to the generosity of the property owner, who felt that instead of letting the space stand vacant, it made sense to put it to good use.   

"He was like, 'I can help you. Why don't you use the space?' And it also benefits the entire community, because when you activate a business, then more businesses will prop up," Golas said.

She said the store was designed to be vibrant, warm and welcoming with a positive energy for its visitors. 

"We're creating a safe space because it's not just this dismal-looking, sad, dilapidated room and a building. It's a very pretty area where people can come in, listen to music, get some clothing, and then they feel good about themselves," Golas shared.

Serving the community 

Recently, many of the store's visitors have come in looking for warm clothing, like hoodies and jackets, to prepare for the upcoming cold weather season. 

In addition to clothes and shoes, the inventory also includes hats and other accessories and sometimes even toys for kids.

The executive director said a lot of mothers and their children are among those seeking its services.

Visitors have also included people who have recently been released from jail and are looking for a way to get a fresh start.

"They didn't have any money, and then they came in, and they got a job interview, and then they had a nice pair of clothing to go to the job interview," Golas shared. 

Social services

The store's initial mission to provide free clothing and other essentials to meet people's immediate needs has evolved into something more. 

Thanks to a new partnership with the longstanding non-profit Bay Area Community Services (BACS), visitors can also receive long-term support through resources for mental health, housing, and other social services.   

"There are a lot of people who are economically in vulnerable positions at the store," Golas explained. "When they come in, they want a few pairs of clothing to feel good about themselves and otherwise wouldn't have been able to afford these clothes, but they're also meeting with the BACS team in the back to see if they can get housing or long-term mental healthcare."

The backstory:

The store first launched in August and has had lines out the door. 

In an Oct. 5 social media post by Oakland City Councilmember Janani Ramachandran, she talked with Golas about how the clothing giveaway began. 

Golas explained that the idea came a couple of months back, as the non-profit explored ways to take excess inventory from businesses and redirect it from becoming waste by turning it into items that the public can use, free of cost.

Styles geared toward celebrities

"We actually had one of our partners, Jeremy Castro, he had an inventory of over 20,000 pieces of clothing that was kind of geared towards celebrities and designed for athletes like Steph Curry and celebrities like G-Eazy and all of this excess inventory was just lying in his warehouse," Golas told the councilmember. "He had no idea what to do with it, and he was afraid that he would have to dump it. So he gave it to us."

And that's how Compassion Threads got its first big bulk of inventory. 

Compassion Threads has hosted a total of almost 10 pop-up events, opening once a week or once every other week. The initiative has given away thousands of pounds of clothing and other free items to some 750 people. 

Run by donations 

The store is largely supplied by companies that have excess inventory that they would otherwise throw out. Sometimes, the supplier is a business that has folded.  

Golas said the store's operation is largely inventory contingent, so its openings depend on whether it's been able to secure enough items to giveaway. 

How it works

The store schedules its openings for Wednesday from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

To take advantage of the program, visitors are asked to sign up for a shopping window on the website. 

The slots are available in 15 minute increments.   

Each visitor can select up to five free items.

As of this story's publication, the dates that were available were the two upcoming Wednesdays: Nov. 4 and Nov. 11. Golas explained the store schedules its visits two weeks at a time.

High demand

The non-profit said the demand for the free items has been high.

 Golas said a widening wealth gap in the Bay Area was a main driving force.  

"There's all of this AI wealth that's making it hard for other people to live because the cost of living is increasing exponentially overnight. I think it's just hard for people," Golas said, adding, "There are multiple factors that are making it worse for people within this community. There's bad policies that are displacing people, encampment abatement policies, et cetera, that are making it really hard for people to get help and care."

Mass clean-up near encampments 

Dig deeper:

Since 2021, the Urban Compassion Project and its army of volunteers have conducted massive cleanups, mostly in Oakland, though the non-profit is now fanning across other cities, including Emeryville, Berkeley, Vallejo, San Francisco and San Jose.

The group said it has cleaned up roughly 1.7 million pounds of trash and items from illegal dumping. 

The clean-ups are often focused on areas near encampment sites. 

"Primarily by encampments because they're illegal dumping hotspots, because when you clean an area, it's less likely to get trashed upon by dumpers. But it also improves the livelihood, at least in the short term, of those people living and residing in those encampments because they don't want to be living within that squalor," Golas explained.

Through that effort, the Urban Compassion Project has made connections with many of the people living at those encampments, many of whom in turn end up helping and joining volunteers in the clean-ups. 

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Many will also go on to take advantage of the resources and support programs through the non-profit.

"The goal is to maintain the cleanliness of the areas, push behind the scenes against policies like encampment abatement, because that's just like completely dysfunctional," she said. "It doesn't work. You're going to displace people. They're going to end up moving somewhere else and then the trash will end up following them. And then they have nowhere to go."

Golas said by helping to keep these areas near encampments clean, it not only combats the major problem of illegal dumping, it helps bring compassion to the way unhoused populations are treated.  

"We're not the government. So the most we can do is at least give them some care in the immediate sense, which means cleaning up where they live and also providing them with temporary resources and now, hopefully, long-term resources through BACS." the executive director explained. 

What you can do:

While businesses with excess inventory are a major source of inventory for the Oakland store, other grassroots efforts are also helping.

The Wardrobe Project, a vintage and modern consignment shop in Oakland, is partnering with Compassion Threads for a clothing drive to collect items for the free store. 

The shop on College Avenue asked for donations of "high quality, functional clothing" with a priority on warm clothing, items for kids, extended sizes of extra large and up.

The Urban Compassion Project said businesses that have an excess of inventory and would like to donate to Compassion Threads can email the organization at info@urbancompassionproject.org.

To avoid paying potentially exorbitant delivery charges, the nonprofit has set up a system to pick up the donated items.  

What's next:

Golas hopes the unique program and its services can continue and expand.

"I haven't seen a place that serves both as a clothing center for people, a place of dignity and a place where you can service people at the same time," she told KTVU. "And in my ideal state, we replicate this model, and I'd have three or four places in downtown Oakland in dormant spaces or places that need to be activated."

Volunteers are the backbone

The Urban Compassion Project said the project is a demonstration of its robust volunteer-based model, with its volunteers reflecting the diversity and altruistic spirit of so many people in Oakland. 

"The whole thing is that we built community here in Oakland where things seem really hopeless," Golas said. "And this community just shows up. It's very easy for us to mobilize volunteers. We're probably like the only org in the Bay Area which has such an active volunteer group like this, that's just ready to fight for every cause." 

She said it's the volunteers who are running Compassion Threads. 

"We're a very small, nimble core team of staff, and we have a lot of volunteers holding up this org," the executive director explained. 

She celebrated the work of those team members who have helped build a compassionate, caring community. And it's a model that allows those on the receiving end of the non-profit's support programs to, in turn, give back.

"I think building a community like this is really important because it boosts overall morale, and you have a happier, more vibrant city if you have happier people," Golas told Ramachandran. "A lot of these folks coming in here are suffering from financial insecurity as the wealth gap widens, and I think it's important that people can come here, get a few good pieces of clothes, go to a job interview, feel good about themselves, and then they come back, and they volunteer and then help out. So it builds this beautiful cycle."