Mate, What’s with all the containers?

If you have ever taken a stroll through Kairos Free Store or Kairos Food Rescue warehouse, you may have noticed that we use shipping containers for just about everything.

The Free Store is in a shipping container.

The new shower and toilet block is in a shipping container.

Our staff offices and conference room are in shipping containers.

Add to that, our proposed mobile kitchen project is in a food truck and our proposed collaboration space is marked by a marquee.

All of this would look perfectly at home in a public market or festival. Under a warehouse roof? Maybe not so much.

So what’s with all the shipping containers?

There are two reasons. The first is about branding. Kairos was “born” in a shipping container. When the concept of a free store where leftover cafe food could be rescued from landfill and re-distributed to anyone who wanted it was in its earliest days, the dream first came to life in a shipping container. The container was fitted out for purpose, and sat in a car park where people could come for free food. This humble beginning is depicted on the illustration used on our website homepage and Facebook banner and has become part of who we are Kairos.

You can read more about the history of Kairos on our About page.

So that all makes sense when you’re giving away food in a carpark - but why did you keep the containers when Kairos moved indoors?

Good question. And we have a good answer.

One of the core objectives of Kairos is sustainability and making the most of our resources. This goes way beyond food. As a charity, Kairos Food Rescue and Free Store are reliant on the generousity of others. We make the most of that generousity by keeping our investments and resources mobile. Should we ever need to relocate premises, we can simply move our containers and trucks to a new location. This allows us to keep the fixtures intact without having to leave anything behind. For example, our new toilet and shower block would only need to have the plumbing and power disconnected to be relocated elsewhere without having to do any new installation or sacrifice the investment already made into these facilities.

It’s all a part of who we are at Kairos, both our beginnings and our future.