Secondhand stuffed toys

　One night when she got home from work, Liebling started doing some research. She realized this wasn’t happening only in her town. Worldwide, millions of old toys end up in rubbish bins every year. Liebling kept thinking all night. “If we can change the idea that stuffed toys lose their value once they are not being loved,” she thought, “then we can show people they have so much left in them, and give them to others. That’s how the Loved Before company began.

　How does it work? People donate soft toys. They can do so through email or by taking a toy to a local store. The original² owner writes down the name of the toy and a story about it. Next, the toy is cleaned, photographed and packaged with its name and story. Every Monday, toys are put up for adoption on the Loved Before website. The company makes a donation of at least half of the money from the money from the sale of each toy.

   Since its creation in 2019, Loved Before has sold more than 50,000 stuffed toys. But the company’s goal is more than just trying to save some toys from rubbish bins. Liebling says, 

“We’re trying to change people’s minds on a really wide level.” She explains that Loved Before hopes to teach kids about the value of loving secondhand things again.