12 Useful Tips for Organizing a Seed Swap

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This is how to organize a seed swap and plant-sharing event that helps people (including yourself) get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event.

This is the tenth year I’ve organized a community seed swap, and our last event was the best we’ve had. We had over a hundred people attend, and countless seeds, bulbs, and plants were shared among them. I don’t think anyone left without something new to grow and a smile on their face. That’s why I’m sharing tips for how you can organize a seed swap for your own community. It’s a great way to help people garden inexpensively and reduce seed waste.

A seed swap is an opportunity for gardeners to organize their seed collections and get rid of the ones they don’t want. They can also use the event to get new seeds that they do want to grow. In all, it’s a win-win for gardeners and reduces wastage and cost. Our event is about giving seeds a chance to grow, saving money on buying new seeds, creating an opportunity to pick up new varieties, and making the event a social gathering where gardeners can talk about all things green and growing.

How to organize a seed swap and plant sharing event that helps people get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event #permaculture #gardening #seedswap

Share Seeds and Plants with a Seed Swap

I think the reason that our own event is so successful is that we’ve had years to perfect it. Each year has been great, but it’s now a well-oiled machine. We know the best way for people to interact and share seeds, how to find the people who’d like to come, and how to make the event free. We actually finished up on Sunday with over £300 without asking visitors to pay for an entrance or participation fee! I remember planning for the first seed swap, though, and trying to find tips on how to run one. It was hard to find detailed information, so I wanted to share 12 tips on how we run ours.

Although there are virtual seed swaps now, these tips are specifically for organizing an in-person swap. As with all events these days, ensure that you provide a safe venue and processes that comply with health and safety measures in your region.

1. Get Friends to Help

The entire idea of a seed swap is to get people together to share resources. This starts in the planning stage, so form an event committee with gardening pals or members of gardening associations and clubs. You can arrange to meet in person to organize the event or schedule Zoom meetings. The benefits of organizing a seed swap with others include:

  • A greater network of potential contacts and people to invite
  • Fresh ideas for organizing and running the day
  • More people to help spread the word and market the event
  • More people to help out on the day
  • Making the swap a fun and community-focused event
How to organize a seed swap and plant sharing event that helps people get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event #permaculture #gardening #seedswap
One of our seed swap events in pre-Covid times

2. Find a Venue and Set a Date

Every year, we’ve booked the same venue and have a great relationship with the society that runs it. It’s a community hall, but if you’re looking for a venue, other ideas include churches, sports clubs, private club rooms, the back room of a pub, and private homes. You could even run the event outdoors, in a barn, or under a gazebo or event tent. Outdoor and airy venues can be better, but if you’re planning a seed swap during the winter, it may be less viable.

Our indoor venue is a comfortable space with plenty of parking, the opportunity for refreshments, and a reasonable room hire fee. One of the benefits of keeping the same venue every year is that people become familiar with it. We have visitors that come every year, and they know exactly where to go and park each time.

Our event is always on a Saturday or Sunday since more people will be able to attend. It begins in the afternoon, and the event lasts around two hours, with the busiest time being the first hour. Over the years, we’ve hosted the event in late winter and early spring, with the latter being more successful. April is a great time for a seed swap since people bring in seeds but also excess seedlings and plants.

How to organize a seed swap and plant sharing event that helps people get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event #permaculture #gardening #seedswap
Some attendees come with a list of seeds that they’re looking for

3. Decide a Sharing/Swapping Method

In my experience, it can be awkward and inefficient for strangers to have to swap seeds with each other directly. Some of this does happen at our event, but the main way that people share seeds is through organized bins.

When people come in the door, tell them how the event works: organize the seeds you’ve brought with you into the bins provided – they’re labeled with ‘Brassicas’, ‘Root veg’, ‘Herbs’, ‘Flowers’, and even ‘Random’. As you move around the circular area where the bins are located, feel free to browse what’s already there and take what you need. For people without seeds to share, there’s a donation bucket in the middle of the table. The suggested donation is 50p for a full packet of seeds.

How to organize a seed swap and plant sharing event that helps people get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event #permaculture #gardening #seedswap
We have a bucket for random seeds that don’t fit other categories

Other methods might work, but this is the best way we’ve found for ordinary gardeners. These are people who’d like to attend without any commitment to having to set up a stall or haggle with individuals over seeds and plants. It’s based on the honor system, and in the five years we’ve run the swap, we’ve had no issues with anyone taking advantage.

4. Make the Event Free

Everyone likes a free event where you can leave with free things! By not charging an entrance fee, you’ll have more people attend, and more people mean more seeds. There are other ways to make money if you need to pay for the room hire or are running the event as a fundraiser.

12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.
Local companies will often give you raffle prizes and free seeds if you ask

5. Get Sponsors for the Seed Swap

The main way we include sponsors in our event is by asking for them to donate raffle prizes. In the week leading up to the event, I let everyone know on our Facebook event what each prize is, and it creates a good build-up to the big day. This year, we had donations of free seeds, compost, a wormery composter, an aromatherapy massage, an apple tree, and vouchers to a local plant nursery.

Other ways sponsors can be involved include funding the room or room hire, advertising sponsorships, and sponsoring seeds to share at the swap itself.

12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.
Seed swap raffle prizes are numbered and displayed on a table

6. Organize a Seed Swap Raffle

A seed swap raffle is part fundraiser and part entertainment and can be a major highlight of the event. At ours, we charge £1 per raffle ticket and draw winners thirty minutes before the end of the event. If the person isn’t there when the raffle winners are drawn, you can ring them and tell them to pick up the item. We also ask for people who attend the seed swap to bring a prize to the raffle. It could be a pair of gardening gloves, a bottle of wine, chocolate, or gardening books.

12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.
Set out donation buckets for refreshments and in places that make sense

7. Donation Buckets

Aside from the donation bucket we place on the seed swap table, we also have a bucket in the refreshments area. It’s based on the honor system again, and we ask for a small donation towards any cake/coffee they serve themselves or for seeds if they didn’t bring anything to share. We don’t write a suggested donation on the bins, but if anyone asks, it’s 50p and left to their discretion. Most of the time, people donate more, though, and this is a great way to raise money for your community garden or a favorite charity.

8. Invite People to Attend the Seed Swap

Getting the word out that you’re having the event is one of the trickiest parts of the entire event. How do you reach the people who you think would like to come? Here’s how we do it:

How to organize a seed swap and plant sharing event that helps people get seeds for free. Includes ideas for booking a venue, sponsors, donations, and reaching people with news of the event #permaculture #gardening #seedswap
Design a poster and display it wherever you can
  • Design a low-ink poster that can be easily printed at home. Print it on colored paper and share it on notice boards, in cafes, at your work, and at your church. Tape it inside your car window, and ask local businesses to post it up, too.
  • Contact the newspaper or radio station to feature a story on the event. You can also advertise in the classifieds, submit event information to online ‘local events’ listings. I’ve gone on the radio in years past and have also featured the event in columns that I’ve written.
  • Create a Facebook event and then invite every gardener you know. Ask them to invite their friends too! This year, I also sponsored the event for £5 to reach out to local people who liked the topic ‘Gardening’ on Facebook
  • Blog and post about the event on social media. If you don’t have a big following, consider getting in touch with a local gardening writer or influencer.
  • Email gardening societies to ask if they could please forward the event info to their members.
  • Get in touch with everyone who has attended a past seed swap event – more on that below.
12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.

9. Sign-in Sheet and Mailing List

If people have come to a seed swap before and enjoyed themselves, they’ll likely want to come back again. What I do to contact these people each year is to:

  • Collect email addresses from people who attend as they walk in the door. However, be clear that you’re using their email for a mailing list.
  • Save the email addresses in a free newsletter app such as Mailchimp. Such applications will allow you to easily create nice-looking newsletters and send them to everyone on your list. It also makes it easy for people to unsubscribe if they’d like. Our sign-ups receive two or three emails per year.
12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.

10. Entertainment for the Seed Swap

Depending on your crowd, you should consider entertainment. Last year, we had local musicians play and it created a lovely atmosphere. We also had a children’s craft area where kids could color or create seed pots out of newspaper. I’d consider the raffle as entertainment as well since everyone has a look at the prizes, and some get very excited to win items!

11. Refreshments for the Event

You don’t walk around the seed table once at our event. You come back for a browse every now and again as people come in the doors and leave. To create a more social atmosphere, have a space set aside for sitting down (also great for people with disabilities or who tire easily) and offer refreshments. This could be in the form of cakes, warm drinks, popcorn, or other easily-served nibbles.

12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.

The organizers of our event always try to bring something with them, and visitors will bring cakes in, too. Don’t be afraid to ask people to help out in that way! This year someone brought in a huge crate of salad greens he’d harvested from his polytunnel that morning. Many people had a nibble, and I took home a bag to serve up at lunch the next day.

12. There will always be leftover seeds!

You’d think people would come in with a few packets and maybe leave with more than they brought. In our experience, it’s the opposite, and this year, we had enough leftover packets to fill a shoebox, aside from about ten jars of self-saved seed.

12 Tips on Organizing a Seed Swap - an event where gardeners share seeds and plants for free.

Finding a cause to donate the seeds to will make your event even more part of the community landscape. In years past, we’ve donated them to a community farm and to a church gardening program. This year we’re saving some to give away at a gardening event later in the year, but we’re also considering donating some to a community garden that’s just started up in a neighboring town.

Ways to Save Money in the Garden

I hope these tips will be useful to you and that more seed swaps are organized in communities large and small right across the world! Watch the video above to see what our most recent seed swap was like, and if you’d like more ideas for reducing waste and costs in the garden, check out these other ideas:

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19 Comments

  1. Steve Sheppard says:

    Hi, thank you for this very useful advice; we are setting up a seed swap for our allotment, and this has been invaluable help. One question, do you provide any guidance to people before hand regarding seed viability/sow-by date? Ie, don’t throw it in if it’s out of date?

    1. The date on seed packets is an indication of when you’ll begin seeing a the decline in the germination rates. After that date, the percentage of seeds that will sprout goes down but some will grow. For that reason, we don’t discourage people bringing in out of date seeds.

  2. Jenny Fusaro says:

    Thank you so much for the seed swap tips. We are hoping to organise our first one this year. You mentioned gardeners being hoarders. Do you have a limit to how old seeds can be that are swapped?

    1. We don’t set a limit but we do set out laminated seed viability charts. That way, people can understand that the seeds they use may have a lower germination rate. Or to avoid picking up seeds that have an older date.

  3. Jamie marsh says:

    Good morning thanks for this it’s been a great help just wondering when?
    Is now a good time to organise a seed swap?
    Many thanks
    Jamie Gayton
    @jamies_little_allotment

    1. Hi Jaime and yes, now (early spring) is a great time to organize a seed swap. It’s a time when a lot of people are seed sowing and still planning the gardening year ahead.

  4. Thank you. Your experience and well articulated advice is so helpful as we plan for next week’s first seed sharing event. We are going to try a seed sharing event with seeds donated ahead of time. Hopefully, next year we will add plants and bulb sharing.

  5. Tristin Christenson says:

    This is exactly what I was looking for! Thank you for posting this. So Helpful!

  6. Thank you for sharing your experiences! We only just came up with the idea of organising a seed swap today. Reading this is encouraging and makes me feel capable to actually give it a go! What a lovely way to bring people together for a joyful Now and a self-empowered Tomorrow.

    1. Good luck with your own seed swap event! I’m sure it will be a resounding success :)

  7. Jane Donut says:

    Thank you! This is super helpful.

  8. Terry Faulkner says:

    Thank you so much for this information on seed swaps. We will be hosting our first sed swap in January 2022.

  9. Momma Doe says:

    Thanks so much for taking the time to share this information. I live in Upstate New York and help to run a Community Garden. We are planning a seed swap for this Spring. It’s super helpful to have the benefit of your experience.
    It’s inspiring also. Makes me want to come join you on the Isle of Man for this lovely event.

    1. If you’re ever on Island around February, you’re welcome to join :) Good luck with your seed swap state side!

  10. Susie Jenkins says:

    Last April the Sandy Public Library in Sandy, Oregon, started a Seed Library. We plan to host our first ever Seed Swap on Seedy Saturday 2018 (January 27th). I’m a little nervous about all the details that I need to learn for a successful event. I see that your event runs about 3 hours with the first hour being the busiest. What time of the day have you found to be most successful?

    1. We’ve always run ours at 1pm on a Sunday. Weather is the most determining attendance factor though — too rainy or too sunny and numbers are down.

  11. Chris Gajewicz says:

    Hello Tanya,

    My name is Chris and I am from Bowling Green, Ohio, USA. Thank you so much for your tutorial on starting a community seed swap. I will be organizing our community’s first on March 18th of this year, (2017). I am the manager of a public garden park in our town and feel that seed and plant swaps are a natural fit for our park and the surrounding gardening community. Just wanted you to know your work has been appreciated and we will look forward to it being a part of our first event!

    1. lovelygreens says:

      You are so welcome Chris! Best of luck to you and your event and I hope plenty of plants and seeds are shared. If you have the chance, I’d love to hear how it went? Looking forward to hearing from you later this spring.