Bex Trevalyan of
Library of Things

Where do you get your inspiration?

My mum has always been an eco warrior and has this deep empathy and connection with other people. She always said to me ‘Yes, you may feel upset about person X but actually think how they are feeling too’. It just set that course of thinking in my head. My Dad has always worked for himself, he’s an entrepreneur who set up a business the year I was born and has worked for himself ever since, so I was weaned on profit and loss sheets and the acumen that something could be a great idea but if it’s not sustainable then there’s no point in it’s existence.

I suppose it’s the marriage of those two ways of thinking plus being brought up in an era where the news is constantly telling us that we’re trashing our planet, and we’re struggling to govern ourselves. It’s a mix of an optimism I’ve always had and an imagination that things could always be better.

Do you have any heroes and heroines?

It’s cheesy, but I’m inspired by the hundreds of people who work at the Hubs and the people I meet every day.

A specific person would be Professor Tim Jackson, who lectured me on my masters course, I really like his theories on the world. He’s one of my favourite economists and has a really nice way of making economics accessible, without using loads of jargon. He doesn’t limit himself to working in academia, he’s working closely with Caroline Lucas and other Parliamentarians to make change at that level as well.

Is it acceptable to say the women I work with too? Emma and Sofia are now the co-directors of LoT. I think it’s partly because we compliment each other really well, but also because they are supremely driven, intelligent and emotionally intelligent that we’ve got to where we are now. We have a long way to go but I think we’ve built a really solid base with a trusting supportive environment which comes from a place of wanting everyone to be heard, wanting there to be balance not needing personal ego to be fulfilled. We’ve taken personal ego out of business and I find it really refreshing, they’re my heroes for that.

Doing this kind of work, there must be a sense of swimming against the stream. If you’re having a tough day, what is it that keeps you motivated?

The day after Trump got elected I came to the Hub, I wasn’t working there that day I just felt like I needed to come in. One of my colleagues, Olivia, was sitting at the front desk with a plate full of muffins and a sign saying ‘we don’t know the answers yet but for now there is love, hope and muffins’. It’s that kind of thinking, that attitude that makes me smile. There are big, powerful players who make decisions that change some of the big structures around us, but actually on a day to day basis it’s the people you live and work with that change your outlook on the world. There’s so much good stuff happening here, there’s so much we can change here, there are 300 members of Library of Things. I know that it’s changed their feeling of the place they live and the people they know and that’s a lot. For me that’s enough people to make it worth me getting out of bed and working to help.

What have been the main hurdles so far?

There is a behaviour change in encouraging people to borrow rather than buy. How do we make it even more convenient, even more rewarding to borrow something? We found that people have been really excited about the concept and love the fact that it’s there. They’ll come in and have a cup of tea with us, often borrowing one thing, sometimes two, but it’s getting into that repeat habit of borrowing instead of buying. There’s some work for us to do on making that experience even smoother and in identifying which items are most in demand.

What are the biggest challenges going forward from here?

Changing attitudes. It’s so entrenched in people who need to use a big expensive item to put a call out to their mates and if that fails, look into how much it costs to buy.

I think there’s also a question about how we sustain ourselves financially, we want each LoT to cover its costs. We’re not interested in creating a charity or being dependent on funding but I think it’s just a question of us working out what those revenue streams are and how to get local people interested. Also, what other organisations are we potentially creating value for? Perhaps housing associations and local authorities who need to create social value or even big waste and resource managers. How can we capture the impact we’re having and ask them to invest in the value we’re creating?

On the flip side, what have been the highlights along the way?

There are lots of highlights, many people have been excited by it and have wanted to support it and been generous with their time and energy.

One of those moments was walking into B&Q West Norwood. We started chatting to the store manager Dennis and realised he was keen to support us with a big donation of kit, it was the same with Patagonia and Berghaus.

Then there’s people who turn up to donate a keyboard that they don’t play any more or maybe a circular saw that’s been sitting brand new and untouched in their shed for 5 years.

Someone came in and their laptop had broken so we signposted them to a local group who do repairs. She came in the next day and stayed for an hour drinking tea and gave us a book she had written, just so chuffed that something like this existed. Putting people in touch with local gardeners and DIY specialists, it’s just the small stuff that actually makes a little difference in someone’s day. There are loads of highlights.

What are your future plans?

There’s work to be done in growing what we’re doing in West Norwood. We’ve realised that people often need to pick up or return an item when we’re not open so we want to experiment with a set of lockers and cupboards that are embedded on street corners. We want them to be able to just check it in and out with a phone so we’re investing in that piece of technology, whilst working out how we can retain a human element. Also, we’re working on taking LoT to different locations. We’ve identified, at this point, four organisations who we’re inviting to a boot camp to come and form relationships, creating a network of people bringing borrowing to communities. Plus we’re working with some libraries to see how LoT can reinvent their role and help them reach different community groups.

I think the LoT model could work in loads of contexts, it’s just working out the specifics. It works particularly well in densely populated cities because there’s literally no space to have things, whereas in the countryside you probably have a garage where you can store a lot of stuff. It could be a more specialised LoT so, for example, if located by the sea, perhaps there is a surfing focus or if it’s located within a creche it’s got more items for kids. The dream is that there would be a LoT on every street corner or in libraries, community centres etc.

What advice would you give the 21 year old version of yourself?

I’d tell her to care less. Care less about what other people think of you, care less about making mistakes. I’d say it to any 21 year old, I’d say it to myself now.

I think everyone has voices of doubt, I’m better at catching those moments now and telling them to shut up. I think that when I started working in this field, it was actually the time that I found it easiest to know who I was and what I was about and to talk passionately about something. I’d spent so long, probably up until and around the age of 21 thinking ‘Who am I and what do I stand for in the world’ but actually I just needed to do something I cared about. Being around the people who brought out the best in me gave me that confidence.

Finally, for someone just finishing education or looking to do something of value. Do you have any advice for them?

I’d say they should ask the question of themselves ‘What’s the easy first step towards your goal, that stretches you but doesn’t make you panic or scare you?’ Then take that step today. Don’t put off working in what you care about because you think you need to get skills somewhere else, you will learn the skills you need by starting to do what you want to do. If it doesn’t pay you money straight away, find a way to work on something on the side so that you can do the thing you care about.