SURREY — A new boutique thrift store in Surrey aims to sell clothing and other merchandise to help build a so-called City Dream Centre here.
Those who operate the shop, called For The Love of Thrifting, also want to spread awareness about plans for their dream facility, which they’d like to open in a large, long-vacant building on 104th Avenue.
The thrift store officially opened on March 29 in a new retail complex at #106-19211 Fraser Hwy., on the Surrey-Langley border.
The new City Dream Centre foundation, online at CityDreamCentre.com, opened the store as part of its effort to support underprivileged and vulnerable people in Metro Vancouver.
Net revenue from the new and “lightly used” merchandise sold at the store will support the foundation’s mission and cause.
“This (store) is a touchpoint for the City Dream Centre, because we don’t have a building yet, but this store will bring awareness to people about it, about what we’re doing,” said Loretta Hibbs, the foundation’s executive director.
“Everybody who comes here gets a card that thanks them for their support and tells them a bit about what we’re hoping to accomplish.”
- RELATED STORY: Surrey church group has big dreams for the large, long-vacant building on 104th Avenue, from Sept. 2016
The foundation dreams of opening a facility at 104 Avenue Centre, a 260,000-square-foot brick building built in 1998 and relegated as vacant pretty much ever since.
The proposed facility is modelled on Los Angeles’ Dream Center, founded in 1994 as a volunteer-driven organization that “finds and fills the needs of over 80,000 individuals and families each month,” according to its website.
The facility’s mission is to “reconnect isolated people to God and a community of support by providing human services that address immediate and long-term needs in the areas of homelessness, hunger, poverty, addiction, education and human trafficking.”
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PICTURED: 104 Avenue Centre has sat vacant, save for a few special events and film work, since it was built in 1998 on 104th Avenue in Surrey, at 142nd Street. FILE PHOTO: Tom Zillich
The project in Surrey was initially an initiative of Surrey’s Relate Church, but is now operating as a foundation independent of the church, said Kelly Voros, one of the project planners.
“It was always the plan for City Dream Centre to become its own entity, so it’s just one of the milestones that we’ve achieved so far this year,” Voros told the Now-Leader.
Hibbs emphasizes that 104 Avenue Centre has not yet been secured for use as Surrey’s City Dream Centre.
On opening day at the thrift store, she clutched a brochure that shows the foundation’s detailed plans for the vacant building.
"We’re not handing out these brochures, because we don’t have use of the building, but it’s information for people who want to know what our goal is, with the floor-by-floor plans, all of that,” she said.
“We’re very serious about this, but it’s millions of dollars, and we don’t have that, so we’re doing everything we can to work toward our goal. And if it’s not that building, then it’s another building. We need somewhere where we can run programs.”
Hibbs said the foundation’s goal is to open three to five stores locally under the For the Love of Thrifting signage, including one at the City Dream Centre itself, as a training facility there.
“First impression is everything,” Hibbs stated. “Creating an atmosphere of excellence, dignity and value was important to me, and quality items with affordable prices is something everybody is looking for. Just as City Dream Centre’s mission is about bringing dignity, value and purpose to others, our goal is that this store will do the same.”
Online, the store can be found at Facebook.com/fortheloveofthrifting.
tom.zillich@thenownewspaper.com