That was in 1985. Forty years later Helen is still there.
When Helen left school at 15, she trained as an ironmonger before moving into a career in retail at the Co-op, where she worked her way up to management.
After giving that up to have a family, she was looking for something to do for herself as her son was at school and her husband worked on the oil rigs.
“I needed something for me,” she said.
The poster
A large volunteer recruitment poster filled the shop window in Perth, catching her eye immediately.
It encouraged people to volunteer for as little as one or two years, explaining how much of a difference it could make to Oxfam.
“I thought, well, I could easily volunteer for two years. And I'm still here,” she told me.
When I told Helen I had no luck finding a copy of the poster, she laughed. “Nobody else remembers it. It was in the shop that day. I don't think I imagined it.”
Making a difference
She told me of a time her husband brought her into the shop and gave her a hug goodbye, when a customer she recognised said “oh, I wish I had somebody to give me a cuddle”.
“So, I went and gave this gentleman a cuddle and said, cuddles are free, there's no charge today,” she reminisced.
Helen is known and loved by her community, both at home and in her shop in Perth, where she has been a constant presence as volunteers and customers have come and gone over the decades.
Meeting new people and seeing familiar faces in the shop every week has played a huge part in keeping her there for forty years.
On the catwalk
When thinking about her time with Oxfam, one memory that sticks out is the fashion show the shop held in the early 2000s.
The event was to showcase their new denim collection, equally loved by the customers and the volunteers.
“I was a cowboy. We just kept the shop open and we were walking about among the customers.”
40 years later
Helen would recommend volunteering to anyone, saying “It can even help people struggling with loneliness.”
The friendships she has made and the feelings of making a difference are what turned her two-year plan into 40 years of commitment.
