Monday, May 12, 2008

Barter Program

A while back, I heard about this new barter program that was starting up in the Flathead Valley. A group of people wanted to start a group where you could barter products/services for others' products or services. All you had to do was sign up, offering something other people may be able to use or want. Once you signed up, you were given three free "HOURS", which is what you pay with. For instance, if I wanted someone to mow my lawn, I'd look under Yard Care, or some similar category in the directory, call someone who is listed as offering that service, and pay them with paper money, or HOURS. One hour is worth approximately $10.00, I believe. We signed up for things like pet-sitting, tutoring, yard work, etc. If someone calls us wanting help with one of those things, they'll pay us with HOURS and we'll then be able to in turn use them to pay someone else in the future.

It basically enables people to hire/rent someone or something that they maybe wouldn't otherwise be able to because they don't have the money. We haven't used ours yet, but I'm thinking that we will soon. I hope so, at least. I am really looking forward to seeing this thing take off. We couldn't make it to the opening meeting/potluck, but I heard there were around 70 people there. I'd like to make it to the next one so we can meet some of the people. I love that someone here is trying to build our community a little. People are spread out to so many far corners of this valley that you can feel very isolated.

So for anyone that lives here, you should definitely get involved. Let me know if you're interested, because it's such a great project. The more people involved, the more successful it will be!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

That sounds like a unique group!
Which reminds me...do you know anything more about raising money (MT Moms) for the women's clinic in Africa? I would love to help out with this, so let me know what we can do!
~Em

Kristen said...

That sounds like a really neat idea!