Beach Boutique Success!

Long Beach’s assistant superintendent Michele Natali has begun The Beach Boutique!

The Beach Boutique is a clothing drive for the Long Beach community. Their slogan is “Give what you can, take what you need!” Anyone can drop off clothing, and anyone can take clothing if needed.

I had the pleasure of asking Dr. Natali a couple of questions about the boutique.

What inspired you to start the Beach Boutique?

“The idea for the Beach Boutique came from the Districts Equity committee, specifically the subgroup working on resources.” The members of the committee as well as Dr. Natali know that clothing is a resource that some students are unfortunately in need of.

Dr. Natali has said that from her experience of having daughters, she knows, “Kids grow out their clothes before they are really worn.” Putting two and two together they decided to look at, “having gently worn clothes donated, that other students can have.”

Is this your first time starting/planning something like this?

The act of donating old clothes is not something Dr. Natali is unfamiliar with: “I usually donate my children's clothes to St. Marys in hope that they get into the hands of those who need it.”

The committee had wanted to try to have an actual space for donations to come in and out, but space has been an issue. “That is when we came up with the idea of a “pop-up,” she explained. “We put together a small pilot of the pop-up concept last June one Saturday at the Arts in the Plaza.”

The pop-up idea was an original and creative way of working around the issue of space.

What would you say was the biggest challenge with the Boutique?

As Dr. Natali mentioned before the biggest issue would have to be space. “We don’t have the space to house the clothes. Luckily, we were able to work with Mr. Epstein to use the gym for our collections and storage.”

Dr. Natali also mentioned that volunteers can also be an issue at times but, “partnering with the High School and Middle School clubs can help to solve that. This year Lauren Clune took on the boutique initiative as her NHS officer’s project.” Dr. Natali hopes that they will always have a student to help run the program for years to come.

Not only is this idea an act of kindness and giving back to the community, but it is also a sustainable way of getting rid of clothes. Instead of ending up in a landfill, your clothes end up with people who need them. You can donate or get clothes from the Boutique at the upcoming spring event!

Or if you want to volunteer or have any questions you can contact Dr. Natali at [email protected]