7 months ago A Drop in the Ocean opened its first Drop Market in the Nea Kavala refugee camp. Now we’re doing it again! Today we’re opening our Drop Market in the largest refugee camp in Greece with around 3000 residents.
When we opened our first Drop Market we were all curious if this way of distributing would work. The concept was entirely new and most of the other methods we had used earlier for distributing, had been both demanding for us and for those receiving necessary equipment. Our first Drop Market was a success from day 1, very much thanks to a logistics-app, developed by one of our volunteers, which gives us a fantastic insight of the inventory and of the camp’s demography.
Now we’re taking the success further to Greece’s largest refugee camp, Skaramangas. While we in Nea Kavala need enough to supply around 500 people with all that they require in terms of clothing, shoes and other equipment, we need to have enough of everything in Skaramangas for around 3000 people. This requires a great deal of planning and a lot of preparatory work. Our great team in Skaramangas has for several months worked hard in order to achieve this, and the residents of the camp have taken part throughout the entire process.
The concept Drop Market gives the residents the freedom of choice. The residents don’t have to stand in endless queues to receive clothing or a pair of shoes that an aid organisation has chosen for them. At the Drop Market everyone gets assigned fixed shopping days, where they can buy what they need with their distributed credit referred to as “drops”. The market has changing rooms so that the residents can find clothes which fit, both in size and colour. This gives them some sense of normality, which is important for people who have lived under inhumane conditions for a longer period of time, and who face an uncertain future. We call it distribution with dignity.
Before the opening day we had more than 26.000 units in stock, and we are really looking forward to get this out to our friends in the camp who desperately need both shoes and underwear.
Some of our first “customers” on the opening day.
Thank you to all the volunteers and residents in the camp who have made this possible to get this up and running, also in Skaramangas!
A massive thank you to all those who have donated clothes or money, so that we have enough merchandise to get started. A huge thank you to our collaborating partners Help Refugees in Greece and Elliniko Warehouse for the support to make this possible!
We will be needing a steady refill for the market for the time ahead, so there is still a need for a lot of support for this project. We will also open our third Drop Market in a few weeks on Chios. For ways how to contribute – click here!
Read press release on NTB here ( in Norwegian)
Here you can see some photos from the last months of work with Drop Market Skaramangas:
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