Charity shops

tiff

I agree with you there Reverbe, I've been volunteering for a couple of months and quite shocked at how much is thrown away unneccessarily. One of the key volunteers hates sorting baby clothes so she dumped a load in the rag bag, yet we're crying out for stock and have a big sign in the window saying stock needed. The other day she binned a pushchair and highchair just because they were dirty in the creases. She could have given them to someone else to wipe over before putting them on the shop floor. The manager herself wont sell childrens shoes because she doesnt agree with it yet our guidelines are only that we cant sell childrens leather shoes as they mould to the shape of the feet. I've seen her dump 6 pairs of excellent condition shoes in the rag bag.

Hobsons_Choice

I think that Mary Portas has a lot to answer for - trying to ponce up the Charity Shops!

hermum

I always find local charity shops to be much better than the National ones.
A friend of mine volunteered in a national one & someone brought in several bags of clothes.
The manager picked out the item from the top of one bag & because there was a button missing, or something like that, a fairly minor thing anyway. She told my friend to bin every bag full that the person had donated, as nothing would be up to her standard.
My friend asked if it could all be checked first, have the buttons & zips removed if the garment wasn't worth selling. Or put out at 50p an item or something, she was told they didn't have time to be messing around with rubbish.
Everything got dumped.
One of our local ones goes to car boots & will take anything that the stall holders have left at the end of the sale, they say that they can make good money selling to the rag man, if they can't sell in the shops.
Their books are always reasonably priced, around 50p each so they sell loads & it's worth popping in every couple of days if you're around.
Whereas the ones that want £2 for a book, are inundated with them as they don't sell.
I like a good old rummage, rather than a posh boutique setting, with volunteers looking down their noses at you.

Flibsey

Hobsons_Choice wrote: »

I think that Mary Portas has a lot to answer for - trying to ponce up the Charity Shops!

hell yes! she needs a good slap!

I used to love our local charity shops, now I rarely venture in because all of the prices are stupid. BUT lucky for me, there's a weekly jumble sale at the local church and everything is soooo low priced.
and near to my mum's house is an old style charity shop, but it's becomming more mainstream since the lady who used to run it finally retired at something like 96.
now it's not overpriced yet, but there's rarely anything above a size 14 on the rails.

Child's winter warderobe was recently updated for £3. that's one pair velvet style purple jeans, 1 long sleeve t shirt, 2 jumper dresses, 1 corduroy skirt and 1 cardigan.

Reverbe

hermum wrote: »

I always find local charity shops to be much better than the National ones.
.

How odd I would have expected almost the type of behaviour mentioned in this thread in the national chain ones but the one I volunteer at is for a local charity that I think also have one shop in another town. They did have another in the next town but that closed down.It's quite a revelation like I said and totally put me off giving any donations. In future I will give to a very small one that arent so snobby or poncified.

Those rag bags cost them money to take away I think and surely it would be better to sell in store at a reasonable price than bin. PPl will buy more if it costs less etc. They raised the price of books recently and I stopped buying - usedto buy quite often before. We have an Oxfam now and what we should be doing is capitalising on the fact we have much lower prices...its a great shop and great USP.. I have worked in retail in a variety of stores and tbh they are getting out of touch with customers. They stock full priced good such as overrpiced homeware and candles etc and now have 35 quid handbags that are just going to sit there and sit there.. they are just bogstandard stuff and worse than the designer ones I have bought in tk maxx for 24 quid..

Flibsey

hermum wrote: »

Whereas the ones that want £2 for a book, are inundated with them as they don't sell.

we have a wonderful thing at the moment set up by the council. it's a free book shop. any books put in the "book bin" at the tip get taken here, dusted off and put on display. it's all in boxes at the moment because they can't afford shelving, but it's amazing! if my daughter is nagging for a treat in town, I've taken to taking her in there hahaha!

it's sort of on a bring and buy or donate change if you can afford it system.

alec_eiffel

Reverbe wrote: »

How odd I would have expected almost the type of behaviour mentioned in this thread in the national chain ones but the one I volunteer at is for a local charity that I think also have one shop in another town. They did have another in the next town but that closed down.It's quite a revelation like I said and totally put me off giving any donations. In future I will give to a very small one that arent so snobby or poncified.

Those rag bags cost them money to take away I think and surely it would be better to sell in store at a reasonable price than bin. PPl will buy more if it costs less etc. They raised the price of books recently and I stopped buying - usedto buy quite often before. We have an Oxfam now and what we should be doing is capitalising on the fact we have much lower prices...its a great shop and great USP.. I have worked in retail in a variety of stores and tbh they are getting out of touch with customers. They stock full priced good such as overrpiced homeware and candles etc and now have 35 quid handbags that are just going to sit there and sit there.. they are just bogstandard stuff and worse than the designer ones I have bought in tk maxx for 24 quid..

The rags - textiles, bags and shoes are sold, so the stores aren't paying to have them taken away.

The Mary Portas thing was interesting. For the first month or so after that series was on the donations at the shop I worked at went through the roof and it was quality stuff, we were receiving donations from people who had never donated before. But once the memory of the show faded donations decreased again. So it was a powerful show for good or ill.

In terms of prices imo they were increasing well before Portas was on the scene. In 2003 when I worked for one of the big charities we "took a fresh look" at our pricing structure and were instructed by head office to not sell books, for example for less than 95p. It was at that point our sales and donation targets started to go through the roof.

Hobsons_Choice

My find of the week: a lovely Per Una summer jacket on the reduced rail of local CS - £1.
Fits perfectly, washable - and I'm thrilled to bits with it!

[Deleted User]

I think more and more folk are using them now as we have to tighten up our belts a bit.I usually have a browse for books mainly and have had some excellent ones for a reasonable price.I also am always on the lookout for reasonable condition home knits as I unpick them wash to get the 'crinkles out' then renknit for my Linus Project charity blankets.I can often get especially white jumpers several ounces of wool which is used in the edging of the 'blankies'These get sent to all four corners of the world for children who often have very little in the way of stuff to keep them warm.I have been knitting for this charity for almost 4 years and last year made around 20 chequered blankets for them.I have seven warm well fed grandchildren and like to think somewhere in this world there are children who are being kept warm at night by one of my 'blankies'It costs me very little apart from my time in the evenings when I'm watching t.v. and I know does so much good.

tiff

I got a lovely John Rocha mac last week for £3.99. Fits perfect and I wore it to an interview yesterday, along with a white shirt bought in a CS when I was away last weekend. I also got a box of 12 jigsaw puzzles to keep my 11 y/o daughter entertained while we were away. I agree more people are buying in charity shops and I love the buzz when I find something I like.