Gift shop a base for volunteer support

A NEW volunteer-run gift shop has opened Ballarat Base Hospital.

Located in the Gardiner Pittard Foyer next to Kitchen Quarters Coffee Shop, the store was officially launched on Thursday last week.

The gift shop will be managed by volunteer team leader Yashmin Khan, who said she’s looking forward to giving back to Grampians Health with her time and effort.

“I went through cancer myself and was treated with the Ballarat Regional Integrated Cancer Centre about a year ago,” she said.

“I’m in remission now and the service from the staff and volunteers was absolutely amazing. I really felt like I wanted to give something back so here I am opening this up.

“We’ve got a lot of locally-sourced products here so it’s all going back into the Ballarat community. We as volunteers have a say as to where the money from this goes as well. It’s a lot more personal.”

Items on sale include baby rattlers, muslin cots, earrings, chocolate gift packs and Ms Khan’s favourite, the ‘Born at the Base’ baby onesie.

Proceeds from the gift shop will go towards Grampians Health’s fundraising efforts, with managing volunteers deciding which projects to support.

Head of fundraising and engagement Sarah Masters said the gift shop is a “win-win-win” for the organisation.

“The volunteers can look at our list of projects and go, ‘This month we want to support palliative’ or ‘This month we want to support aged care.’ It’s giving them some degree of autonomy,” she said.

“It’s also making sure these are priority projects for the organisation since it’s from a list of things we already need.

“The other side of this is on Eureka Hospitality who have the lease on our cafeteria which the gift shop was part of the fit-out of that area.”

Operating on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 11am to 3pm, the gift shop is currently staffed by four volunteers and Ms Khan said she’d love to see more people put up their hand to help.