Bean counters trade paper clip to raise £2,500

NOTTINGHAM accountants Tenon are taking part in "Trade Aid" and looking to barter their way up from a single red paper clip to raise as much money as possible for the Princes' Trust.

The charitable competition is based on the experience of Kyle MacDonald, a Canadian man who managed to barter his way from a single paper clip to a two-storey farmhouse in the space of a year.

Ten teams from across the Midlands are taking part in the challenge.

The 'Tenon Traders' – known otherwise as Lisa Sanders, Claire Lovell, Carl Swansbury and Philip Olagunju – are the only East Midlands team to be taking part.

Trading for the team has been exceptional and even at the launch event the team managed to trade their paper clip for a bottle of Lanson Champagne simply by coming up with the most innovative trading ideas.

Since then trading has been brisk with the champagne quickly traded for a signed photograph of Brian Close (the former Yorkshire and England cricketing legend).

This has since been traded for a night for two at the luxury Lace Market Hotel in Nottingham with dinner and breakfast thrown in courtesy of James Blick and the Finesse Collection.

Over the next three months, the teams will be looking to build on their successful trades and bartering deals, which must finish on January 8, 2010.

From this date each team will have three weeks to sell their final item. The team that raises the most money will be named as the winner of the "Trade Aid" competition.

Every single penny raised will go to the Prince's Trust, a charitable organisation focused on helping the one million young people in the UK that are not in education, employment or training. The team have set themselves a target of £2500.