Building a digital charity marketplace with skills-based volunteers

As a digital platform designed to help charities sell donated clothing online and reduce fashion waste, cherry was ambitious, technical and deeply values-driven. Built as a non-profit Community Interest Company (CIC), with plans to become a CIO, cherry set out to tackle a problem that’s growing fast across the UK.

What Bradley didn’t yet know was how to find the people who could help bring it to life.

That changed when he discovered Reach Volunteering.

Clothing waste is rising rapidly, charity shops are overwhelmed, and the high street alone can no longer keep up. Without accessible digital routes, charities often become the final stop for unwanted clothing with much of it ultimately discarded.

Bradley was building cherry with no budget to hire developers, designers or marketers. While he had technical expertise himself, he knew the project couldn’t progress without more capacity - and that relying on one person was a risk.

Through Reach Volunteering, Bradley posted a small number of clear, skills-based roles, starting with software developers. The response was far greater than he expected.

Developers, designers, UX specialists, marketers and product thinkers joined from across the UK and beyond. Some became long-term contributors. Others stepped into leadership roles, with several now operating at board level.

But what made the difference wasn’t just the skills. It was the connection.

“It always felt like I was talking to real people,” Bradley says. “Whether it was volunteers or the Reach team, if I needed help, someone was there.”

In just one year, cherry has built a fully functioning trial app, created a volunteer community spanning the UK and overseas, and developed an open, collaborative platform where anyone can contribute to the mission. Remarkably, it has achieved all of this on a budget of just £14 a month.

Equally important is the resilience cherry now enjoys. When Bradley is pulled away by everyday life, progress continues. Issues are picked up, momentum holds.

“I’ll see an email pop up saying someone’s commented on GitHub - ‘don’t worry, I’ve got this.’ Without Reach, we’d be miles behind.”

For Bradley, Reach Volunteering didn’t just help him recruit skills. It helped him build a community.

“These are people I’d genuinely call friends now,” he says. “We stay on calls longer than planned. We care about the mission.”

His advice to other charities and social ventures is simple.

“If you need skills you can’t afford, and you want people who actually care - use Reach. Whether you’re digital or not, local or national, there’s space for you.”

And for cherry, the journey is only just beginning.

If you’re curious about how cherry works, you can explore the project at https://cherry.org.uk, where there’s an interactive prototype you can play with to see the platform in action. For those who want to dive deeper or contribute directly, cherry is built in the open on GitHub at https://github.com/Cherry-CIC