Miscellany Finds is a thriving Commercial Drive thrift store that offers a warm welcome, fabulous selection and exceptional prices on clothing, shoes, jewelry and accessories, housewares, antiques, vintage, retro and one of a kind pieces, books, magazines and LPs and a variety of social programs for women and youth. Our store is a social enterprise—a revenue-generating business that has social goals. As with all social enterprises, we invest our profits back into the community to fund social and environmental change. Our programs empower women and youth who are considered “hard to place” in the work force. We’ve helped hundreds of marginalized women and youth transition back into society. Miscellany Finds grew from a vision to create a thrift store that would encourage sustainability through recycling and reusing goods while empowering women through a variety of support and training programs. Today, profits from the Miscellany Finds storefront funds programs that help women and youth transition into fuller, stronger lives. In addition, the store itself has become a vital social hub valued by the local community. We invite you to stop by and become part of our story!

Miscellany Finds is a social enterprise dedicated to reaching marginalized women who would like to transition back into society. We are committed to the development of programs and training that benefit women of all ages to help them recognize and reach their full potential, through holistic and practical life skills. We endeavor to actively find ways through our social enterprise to create jobs so women will have secure positions after long term practicum with the social enterprise. We will hold ourselves to the strictest standards of ethical behavior and commit to moving the woman’s community forward with integrity and dedication to our work. Women cannot grow healthy families unless they themselves are on a pathway of growth and empowerment, to eradicate oppression by working with women and girls of all races, creeds, religion and/or cultural differences to find creative ways to help build self esteem in girls and women from marginalized communities.

Question: How are you supporting other local businesses?

Answer: All of our inventory is donated, but we do purchase from local businesses for all of our service needs, like accounting, banking, waste management, maintenance, employee benefits and more. When we make purchasing decisions, we also look for businesses that are social enterprises, women owned businesses, etc.

Question: What social practices are you proud of?

Answer: The mission of our social enterprise dedicated to reaching marginalized women who would like to transition back into society. We believe that women cannot grow healthy families unless they themselves are on a pathway of growth and empowerment, to eradicate oppression by working with women and girls of all races, creeds, religion and/or cultural differences to find creative ways to help build self esteem in girls and women from marginalized communities. We are committed to the development of programs and training that benefit women of all ages to help them recognize and reach their full potential, through holistic and practical life skills. We are actively finding ways through our social enterprise to create jobs so women will have secure positions after long term practicum with the social enterprise. We will hold ourselves to the strictest standards of ethical behaviour and commit to moving the woman’s community forward with integrity and dedication to our work.

Our programs empower women who are considered “hard to place” in the work force, including those who’ve experienced domestic violence, addiction, correctional institutions and sex trade work. Participants are referred to us by our partners in the community, including government-based employment centres, PLEA programs for at-risk youth, Correctional Service Canada, community courts and the Ministry of Children and Family Development. We have many support programs, including a job skills program to help women get back into the workplace, a youth initiative to help youth meet credit requirements for community volunteer career and planning (CAP) hours, a gift certificate program that provides gift certificates to women in need to purchase the clothing and household goods to set up a home, a ready for work program that provides hands-on employment training internships for women and youth in our busy retail store, and several others to promote well being and self care.