Switching unnecessary gifts for native trees

By Tilly van Eeden

Meet our star Good giver, Peter!

With five charitable registries under his belt, two Christmases and three birthdays, Peter Galbraith must be our most prolific registry giver (maybe with the exception of Christine, our own Chief of Good!).

Peter started becoming more aware of environmental concerns at university, where he began looking for ways to reduce his carbon footprint.

“We live in a fundamentally broken society, where many of us work 40+ hours a week, and fritter the money away on things we don’t need, destroying the natural environment as we go, and we don’t actually seem to be much happier for it!”

This realisation led him to The Good Registry, where he found that instead of doing harm, receiving unnecessary gifts every birthday and Christmas, he could do some good. Peter has since turned a few hundred dollars worth of unnecessary gifts into good for animals and the environment, with his registries donating to the SPCA, WWF, and Million Metres.

Peter says the environment is a cause that he is very passionate about. “I think the biggest issue facing humanity and all beings on this planet is the degradation of our environment, and the climate crisis. The charities I want others to donate to [through his charitable registries] are doing great mahi in this area.”

Peter wants people to know that they shouldn’t be concerned about raising large sums of money from a birthday or Christmas registry. He says that a little bit of good is better than nothing, and still has the ability to make a difference.

For his most recent registry, for his 27th birthday, Peter’s friends and family have donated $100 so far. Peter’s chosen charity is Million Metres, who are on a mission to restore at least one million metres of waterways across Aotearoa. To some, $100 might seem a small amount, but it’s enough to plant 15 native trees!

Peter has a message for anyone that shares his environmental concerns, “Please sign up to The Good Registry, and each birthday/Christmas, you can help create the world that you want to live in”.

We’re so grateful to be supported by amazing people like Peter. If you’re as passionate about protecting the environment as he is, creating a registry for your next birthday, Christmas, or corporate giving occasion is an easy way to make a difference. You can create a registry here (it’s simple too!).

We have heaps of awesome charity partners that work hard to protect our natural environment, you can see a full list here.

About The Good Registry

The Good Registry is a gift website where people gift the power to do Good.

Anyone from small kids to big businesses can show they care with donations to good causes instead of unnecessary gifts — using charitable gift cards or charitable registries:

• Create your own Good Registry for a special event (like Peter has) and ask friends and family to donate to a charity you choose.
• Give Good Gift Cards instead of traditional gifts, to show people you are thinking about them, and enable them to donate to charities they care about.

We have 65 partner charities that our Good Sorts can choose to support.

You can hear from good kiwis and businesses who have used Good Registries and Good Gift Cards to give more simply, sustainably and kindly, on our inspirational Giving Wall.