FAQ - Frequently asked questions

LocalHero sees itself as a central platform that makes it easy for you to find places near you where you can help with donations in kind.

We have made the experience ourselves that it takes an insane amount of time to sift through the various communication and information channels, be it homepages, social media channels or podcasts, to find suitable information. Often, requests are only posted exclusively on specific social media channels - not only to the detriment of those willing to donate, who do not use these channels and thus never hear about it, but also to the detriment of the fundraising agencies, who thus never reach you in the first place. That's why LocalHero exists.

On the LocalHero platform you can find donation locations in your neighbourhood. To do so, indicate on the start page where you would like to search or click directly on the menu item "Map". In the map view, you have the option of filtering directly to whom or what you would like to donate. Alternatively, you can also use the search function, for example if you want to donate to something specific.

LocalHero is primarily about finding places where you can drop off donations in kind - be it clothes, food, electronics or media such as books and CDs that you may still have lying around unused at home.

On behalf of all donation locations, we would like to point out that basically only clean and intact (unless otherwise stated) items should be donated. Listen to your wits.

Nevertheless, we would like to point out that many of the donation locations and associations are also happy to accept financial aid. You can find out more about this on the respective homepages of the donation locations.

We are thoroughly convinced of the principle that people who can help should also help. No one is safe from getting into a predicament in their life and needing help, be it due to private strokes of fate or external influences such as natural forces, warlike and social conflicts or economic grievances. We can hardly avoid such situations, but what we can do is to cushion them and to catch and support people (and animals) in need of help.

There are many ways to help: you can actively support various projects as a volunteer (e.g. via deinehrenamt.de), through financial support or donations in kind.

Donations in kind, such as used (but intact) furniture, clothes, books/CDs or toys, have the additional advantage that they can be given new life and do not have to be thrown away.

Some donation centres, which can be found on the LocalHero map, offer you the option to pick up donations from your home. This is often the case for bulky items such as furniture. If you are interested in a pick-up, it is best to ask the donation point yourself. Information on this can often be found in the description text.

LocalHero is not processing your donations but provides an overview of different drop off locations. As our goal is to provide a holitisc overview of organizations to whom you can donate, we have the feature on our website that allows anybody to add additional organizations. Therefore, we recommend to properly check the website and imprint of the organization you are planning to donate to. While we are aiming to regularly visit and verify the organizations we, unfortunately, cannot always ensure that they are legit.

If you want to send your donation as a parcel please use the contact details of the respective organization from on our website to clarify it with them upfront.

LocalHero’s goal is to connect those in need with those who can give. Here you can find all kinds of organizations and charities to whom you can donate physical goods.

We were founded at the beginning of Russias attack on Ukraine to help donorts find charities spots and their drop off places easily.

The donation locations, which can be found on the LocalHero map, decide for themselves what the donation will be used for and where it will go. Often there is a hint in the short descriptions: Sometimes they are sold for small money, sometimes they go to people in need, sometimes to animals.

To search specifically for donation locations for a particular group, LocalHero offers a filter option that allows you to filter by the following options:

• Children & Youth
• Homeless
• Refugees
• LGBTQ+
• People with disabilities
• Orphanage
• Hospice
• Hospitals
• Refugees
• Single parents
• Miscellaneous
• Animals

No, we are a charity and do not benefit from the operation of this website, the information collected or your user behaviour.

If you have found an error - be it because a donation location no longer exists, the address is wrong, or because it now accepts other donations in kind - you can contact us at any time. To do so, either write us a message directly at info@localhero.network, or go to the "Suggest changes" link on the respective donation location page.

Short answer: No. LocalHero itself does not own any space to store your donations. Please go directly to the donation locations you find on LocalHero or contact them.

If you know a donation point and would like to publish it on LocalHero to make more people aware of it, click on the button "New entry" in the menu (desktop: top right; mobile: in the burger menu). There you will find a form with which you can describe the donation point and what the donation point is looking for as well as possible. In order for others who are willing to donate to be able to find the donation centre easily, it is advisable to describe what is needed there as precisely as possible.

At the moment (2022), LocalHero focuses on German-speaking countries and tries to build up as dense a network of information as possible. Nevertheless, it also allows you to add donation sites outside of Germany. You can see if there are donation centres available for the country you live in by scrolling to the respective country on the map view.

We try to keep the entries on the LocalHero map as up-to-date as possible. However, with hundreds of entries, this will not always be possible in a timely manner. To see when a donation location was last updated, you will find a date stamp on each donation location page. If you are unsure, it is a good idea to simply check with the donation centre. Each of the donation sites listed on LocalHero contains a link that leads to the source of information of the original donation request.

Good news! Even though CDs have been increasingly replaced by digital formats in recent years, there are still collection points that are happy to receive CDs. To see which donation points accept your unwanted CDs, simply go to the LocalHero map and enter "CD" in the search field.

The iron rule: books are not thrown away. But even if you don't need them anymore and the shelf is bursting at the seams, you can do something good and donate the books to organisations that make them available to those in need. To see which donation centres accept books, you can use our built-in filter option. Simply visit the LocalHero map and select "Books" under "What?". You should now see all the donation locations that accept your books.

We are very happy about your interest in helping us! You can help us in many ways:

1. We are always looking for volunteers who are willing to manage a specific region - such as adding, verifying and keeping entries up to date. Contact us if you are interested!
2. We also welcome any feedback. Maybe you found a bug on the platform? Or you have an idea how something could be done better? Feel free to write us a message.
3. So that many people can get to know us, tell them about us - or, quite simply: share our news on the social media channels.

In order to publish a new entry for a donation point on LocalHero, you will find a form after clicking on the button "New entry" in the menu (desktop: top right; mobile: in the burger menu). In order for people who are willing to donate to find your entry easily, we recommend that the information be as specific as possible.

Before your entry appears on LocalHero, the information submitted via the form is first checked by the LocalHero team. After the validation is completed, we publish the entry.

If you see that information about a donation point is outdated and no longer correct, you can notify us at any time using the "Suggest a change" button. Please try to describe briefly what has changed.

To delete a donation post from the LocalHero map, please email us or contact us via our social media channels (Instagram, Twitter) and write us why the post should be deleted.

If you have found an error - be it because a donation location no longer exists, the address is wrong, or because it now accepts other donations in kind - you can contact us at any time. To do so, either write us a message directly at info@localhero.network, or go to the "Suggest changes" link on the respective donation location page.

LocalHero tries to include and list only charities that it believes in. The aim of their charity can take various forms (such as supporting the homeless, refugees, single parents, animals and others), but basically always relates to need.

If you are unsure whether the charity you wish to enter is accepted, simply contact us via social media or email.

If you notice that an important target group or term (label) for donations is missing when setting up a new entry, simply write us a message. We will check and add it as soon as other donation locations can benefit from this addition.

We welcome all feedback on LocalHero. Just send us a message via info@localhero.network or our social media channels.

Yes, even though LocalHero is 2022 mainly focussed on German based regions, you can still enter donation spots that are located in other regions of Europe. We will still publish them, if we can verify their charity. (To make this easier for us, please enter the donation spot information in English.)

You can reach us via info@localhero.network or through our social media channels Instagram and Twitter.

LocalHero currently works with a simple list principle. Currently there is no feedback function to see how many people are willing to bring donations in kind to a specific donation point. If you need something like this, contact us and we will find the best way to give you this feedback.