Jodi Gerstenhaber outside her home in Seymour. The items on her porch were among the many things she has gifted on the Buy Nothing Seymour forum.
Tabitha Baczek put out a plea on Facebook, seeking gently used or new bras to donate to a nonprofit. Within an hour, there were more than 50 bras sitting in a box outside her house.
The items vary, but many exchanges are similar on the Buy Nothing Oxford page.
Baczek launched the Oxford forum in May, a spinoff of a previous group that included Southbury. Oxford’s group had 871 members as of the second week in December. It’s one of three Buy Nothing forums (https://buynothingproject.org/find-a-group/#CT) in the lower Naugatuck Valley – the others in Seymour (662 members) and Shelton (425 members).
The national project (https://buynothingproject.org) seeks to prompt community networking and sharing among neighbors.
“My main goal is just to make a difference in our community,” Baczek said. “And I see all of these relationships forming and it’s bringing everyone together, especially during the pandemic.”
The premise is simple: members of the group can offer items or services as gifts, or can post wishes. Givers can select anyone they want, for any reason, to share their items with. The group also encourages gratitude posts about the exchanges. Items range from clothing to extra school lunches.
My own experiences with the Seymour forum prompted me to report and write this column about the groups.
I joined Buy Nothing Seymour in April, less than a month after COVID sent me home to isolate while juggling work, childcare and existential dread about the pandemic.
Joining the group was a nice distraction, and it initially appealed to my desire to limit the amount of waste I produce. The site has helped me declutter in a way where I feel satisfied the items are being used.
But I’ve found it has also connected me with my neighbors. For example, recently, another mom introduced herself at the playground, and said she had received some of the baby items I offered on the site. That’s a small connection, but I’ve heard several other similar examples from other members in the Valley.
“I connected with a woman for some school lunches we had left over,” said Rebecca Riemer, the Seymour group’s admin. “Her daughter and my daughter had been asking to play together.” Now they have plans to get together, post-COVID.
In Oxford, the group rallied around a family that had an unexpected death in July. The family had requested paper napkins for an outdoor remembrance service.
“People started bringing food, tables, table clothes, utensils, everything they needed,” Baczek said, noting the support helped connect the group in its early days. “That’s when people start making relationships and coming together.”
Now Oxford’s page is thriving, and Baczek even organized a town-wide secret santa swap this year.
Wonderful Surprises
In an age where almost anything you want can be found, purchased and delivered to your door with a couple clicks through a website, the Buy Nothing forum puts a little excitement back into giving and getting.
There’s a certain level of serendipity to the exchanges. I had just finished posting leftover moving boxes one day in October, when my neighbor shared a wish for some boxes for her daughter’s upcoming move.
In Shelton, forum admin Bruna Salvio’s son recently asked her for his very own Christmas tree to put in his bedroom.
“No sooner had he mentioned this idea, I went on and found someone had posted a 6‑foot artificial tree,” Salvio said. “We always joke that if you discuss something in our kitchen, you will go online and start seeing ads for that thing. If someone was listening, it worked out well, because there was the tree.”
During COVID especially, the forum has given people a chance to get new items despite financial hardships, or simply avoid entering stores.
Though, Salvio says, COVID is hindering one of the main goals of the Buy Nothing movement: making those personal connections with neighbors.
Community Norms
It’s not all success stories. Recently, Seymour members complained about someone taking items designated for other recipients. Jodi Gerstenhaber said someone took a Starbucks travel mug that she had posted on the site, before she had selected a recipient.
“I came back to the group and was like, ‘Whoever took the Starbucks tumbler, I hope you enjoy it, but you’re ruining the spirit of the project,’” said Gerstenhaber, who often shares posts about the Little Free Library (https://www.facebook.com/rainbowreadinglibrary) she runs in her yard on Emma Street.
Riemer researched the complaints and was able to identify the offending member. She reached out and had a conversation with the person.
“I gave them time away from the group, and said ‘That’s not how we interact.’ We’re all based on truthfulness and honesty, and that’s not being honest,” Riemer said.
Gerstenhaber said she wouldn’t let the interaction deter her from participating in the forum.
Jodi Gerstenhaber shows off the Rainbow Reading Little Free Library she created with her children on Emma Street in Seymour. She got more involved in the Buy Nothing Seymour forum in part to promote the free book exchange.
“All of my other experiences have been incredibly positive,” she said, mentioning a recent exchange where she gave her kids’ old train set to a woman to share with her grandchildren. “She posted back that her grandkids were so happy. That’s a nice feeling. It didn’t cost me anything.”
The community norms are centered on ground rules for the Buy Nothing Project — rules that at first seemed excessive to me, but that I now realize help make the forum more like in-person interactions.
Each person can only belong to one Buy Nothing forum, and it must be in their hometown. When people from Ansonia and Derby reach out to local admins seeking to join, the admins recommend starting a group in those towns.
“That’s the whole thing. It’s hyperlocal,” Riemer said. “It’s neighborly, and you have a short commute to go get something you need. You can wish for something as simple as a cup of sugar. But what’s the point of wishing for a cup of sugar if you have to drive several towns to get it?”
The admins are strict about only offering or asking for items — no exchanges of money or recommendations for where people can buy items.
“It’s just about helping one another,” said Baczek. “We don’t want to send people somewhere else, because they know they can go somewhere else. This group is to give where you live.”
Users are not supposed to delete posts, or private message each other without permission. Those rules help prompt transparency around transactions, as most conversations happen in the comments.
And the big push is to have posters let items “simmer” for some time before picking a recipient.
“People are so used to first come, first served,” said Salvio. “But imagine you have two people, one who works all day and one who is home looking on Facebook. You want the one who doesn’t get to a computer until late at night to get a shot at something too.”
The rules take some getting used to, but the admins said they help make the community feel more connected.
“We’re not there to judge or troll,” Baczek said. “We’re there to remind people of the mission and the values and the rules of the project. We kind of let the group run itself, and see those relationships and the gifting happen on its own.”
