Innovative job-creation project restores lives

When Tarn Derman sees a pile of scratchy pallet wood or a smashed up cupboard, he sees potential.

He sees a new bed, a trendy bookshelf or a patio table, which is why he is the creative force behind Restore Job Creation, an enterprise started by the Stirling Baptist Church six years ago.

Fashioned from used billboard vinyl, the funky bags can be bought at the church’s resource centre which opens on the first Sunday of every month. They and the wooden décor pieces also sell at expos and craft markets, and online shoppers can find them on stirlingbaptist.com or on the Restore Job Creation Facebook page.

Shoppers in search of good second-hand clothes, baby-wear and equipment like cots and car seats, have a raft of choice at the Ithemba Clothing Store in Vincent Road.

“The two women we employ sort and clean everything and sell it for a nominal price. They run it like a proper retail store,” Derman said.

Former debt collector, Annelise Solomon, was straightening a row of meticulously age and colour-coded babygrows and said she was ecstatic to land a job at Restore Job Creation after enduring unemployment for four years.

“I am a single mom and got this job in December 2014 just as I was wondering how I was going to buy my little girl something for Christmas. I was desperate. This job has given me life.”

Vouchers to the store are available at Breath of Life and are a life-saver to the many who cannot afford to buy anything at all. Besides creating jobs and recycling used materials and clothes, the initiative also props up the church’s other ministries, so proceeds from the Ithemba Clothing Store go to Breath of Life, while profits from the Ithemba Building shop are channelled into Restore Home.

“Our primary mandate is to create jobs, but we also appeal to both affluent markets who want custom furniture, and to those who cannot afford to buy new. We offer affordability and uniqueness plus we help save the environment,” Derman said. — barbarah@dispatch.co.za