Nulpurr Remote OpShop, Urapunga NT | Now Open

Remote Northern Territory Aboriginal community of Urapunga plant the seed of success with the opening of their community-owned opshop – Nulpurr Remote OpShop, Urapunga NT.

The Urapunga Community in remote Northern Territory has opened the doors to their community-owned op-shop – ‘Nulpurr Remote OpShop’. Facilitated by Remote OpShop Project, a not-for-profit organisation fostering the development of Indigenous enterprise in remote Australia.

“The community has had its problems in the past but we as a community have always had faith and kept fighting for the things we wanted, and as the result to all that, we have our community store up and going again.”

“When we heard about the op-shop the community was very excited to have another small business running and the benefit of the two shops will have a very big impact on the community now and will continue into the future as well.” Annie Daniels, Daughter of the late David Daniels who was the Traditional Owner and Urapunga Aboriginal Corporation Director.

Urapunga is an Aboriginal community located 600 kilometres south-west of Darwin near the southern edge of Arnhem Land. Home to 108 people, Urapunga is nestled between the two big river crossings – the Wilton and the Roper.

Remote OpShop founder Tanya Egerton met sisters Margaret, Kathleen and Rhonda Duncan, Urapunga Elders and their family, in February 2016. At that time Tanya worked with Margaret to facilitate a range of enterprise projects in Katherine and surrounding communities as a coordinator for Enterprise Learning Projects (ELP).

This included a large scale online campaign for the donation of pre-loved clothes resulting in 500+ boxes of donations from across the country delivered to the remote community of Jilkminggan. The surplus clothing from the original clothing-drive has been used to launch the Urapunga Opshop.

“Establishing an op-shop as an ‘opportunity hub‘ for community-driven Indigenous social enterprise provides broad benefits.”

“There’s lots of fantastic ideas, natural resources, and cultural knowledge that make these businesses truly unique. But sometimes people need a little bit of help to get kickstarted. The op-shop provides a safe supportive space for people to get the kind of capacity building in entrepreneurship they need to further develop their own ideas.”

“It also provides independent seed funding for new ideas to start and grow. While answering the local need for accessible and affordable clothing.” Tanya Egerton, founder Remote Opshop Project.

Rhonda Duncan, Urapunga Elder is leading the development of the op-shop, “We’ve got a lot of big plans ahead of us, like the op-shop, tourism, accommodation and art. We’re currently working on getting more funding and developing business skills within the community.”

“We want to make things out of materials that are already here, like tables out of Mahogany, weaving baskets out of pandanus, selling clothing and making bags and skirts, quilts out of the op-shop clothing and fabric.”

“I feel happy and proud of the community for making this happen” commented Rhonda.

Remote OpShop Project will work with the community to fulfil their long-term aspiration of establishing local enterprises, the next step is to construct a permanent space that will be used as workshop and retail outlet.