10 steps to create the perfect OLIO listing
Step 1 - What to share
Firstly, you need to check that what you’d like to share complies with OLIO’s ‘what can and cannot be added’ - check the guidelines.
Step 2 - Add your listing
To add a listing, tap the purple button at the bottom of the app’s home screen.
Step 3 - Choose a category
Ensure you select "free" and then ‘Food’ or ‘Non-food’. The ‘wanted listing’ button is kept unmarked (you only select this when you’re looking for a particular item).
Step 4 - Categorise your items
Put sensible types of items together. Don't bundle a million different items into one listing. Separate into categories, to help your requesters.
Step 5 - Choose a Title
For the title, you’ll need to choose something clear and appealing e.g. ‘Apples freshly picked from my garden’ or ‘Wholemeal Baguettes’, the more eye-catching the title the more likely it is you will receive a request!
Step 6 - Write a description
In the description, please remember state the following:
QUANTITY - write something like 3 x cheese sandwiches.
DATE – If possible, choose a photo where the use by/ best before date is visible, or/ and write the best-before or use-by dates if available, (⚠️ remember: by law you cannot share food past its use-by date).
QUALITY – If needed, i.e. freshly prepared, bruised, packet a bit open (anything that you share still needs to be safe to eat)
E.g. 2 x Trio of Olive Bloomer (best before 06 July 2021)
Step 7 - Choose pick up times
Please add your preferred pick up times and ensure that you don’t offer a time that is past the use-by date. *TIP* try to be as flexible as you can offering at least a couple of hours window.
Step 8 - Set the expiry
Adders can choose how long they’d like the listing to be up for, ranging from "until midnight" for use by date food items, 1 – 8 hours or 1 – 28 days. Please choose the appropriate ‘List for’ time.
For example, if you have food that has a use-by date today, you must ensure it’s unlisted by midnight of today.
For items that have a best-before date, these can be distributed after the date so in this instance you might select ‘1 day’ to ensure the food is still great quality.
After the time set, if you haven’t received a request the listing will be automatically unlisted.
Step 9 - Delay or no delay?
When adding listings, you have the option to allow all users to see your listings immediately OR give the opportunity for newbies to see your listings first. To allow all users to see your listings you must select ‘no delay’. If you want to give newbies first dibs, you can choose either a 1 or 2 hour delay. OLIO recommends showing to newbies first as this gives any new users a chance to request and hopefully give them a great first experience! 😊
(You’re nearly there!) Please check your ‘pick up location’ is set correctly. It’s best that you press the ‘locate me’ button and ‘set pick up location’ button so that your listing will be added against your most recent location. N.B. if you update your location on the app under the location settings, this doesn’t automatically update your listings on the app.
✅ You're done! Submit!
Finally, once you’ve completed all the fields press ‘submit’. Once submitted, a page will pop up with a green tick to confirm your listing has been successfully uploaded. Then when you receive your first request, you can start arranging the collection – woohoo! More than half of all listings on OLIO are requested within the first 60 minutes, and more than 80% within 24 hours.
