Quality of Donations

C_Ronaldo

tom31 wrote:

Hey Everyone,


We try to sell most books but we keep a record of how long they have been on the shelf and sometimes, no matter how much we hate it, we have to bin them.

re the books couldnt you offer them to a hospital for example, dont know if they have things like that at hospitals, it depends if theres one near you, any childrens books to a dentist/doctors or a hospital again

Contains_Mild_Peril

tom31 wrote:

As has been said, toys without a CE mark on arent accepted.

The sooner the powers-that-be overturn this ridiculous ruling, the better. Though most modern toys would conform to both British Standards and CE regulations, the CE is (or was when it was first introduced) actually less stringent.

We also dont accept childrens clothes that are designed for ages 8-9 + because they dont sell.

That surprises me. My local Oxfam shop sometimes does them 4 for £1 when they're overstocked, and they seem to shift quite a few.

We try to sell most books but we keep a record of how long they have been on the shelf and sometimes, no matter how much we hate it, we have to bin them.

How much do they get reduced first? My local Cats Protection shop has a 15p bookcase, and my local Oxfam occasionally sells hard-to-shift books by the boxful. On the other hand, my local Red Cross shop, which tends to price them cheaply to start with, just seems to continue accumulating them!

krisskross wrote:

I worked for a while as a volunteer in a charity shop. Had to stop as I always left feeling itchy and filthy. I had no idea that some people take black sacks full of unwashed smelly clothes, yes even underwear and think a charity shop has a use for them.

Ew!_pale_
P.S. I wonder if they think the spoof money-saving tip of using charity shops as a laundry and ironing service and buying your stuff back actually works!

GiveItBack

krisskross wrote:

We have just moved and found a few things we had no further use for.

One item was a never used indoor TV aerial still in the box. My husband took it and a few other things into a local charity shop where he was told no they didn't want it. In the shop at the time was a chap looking for an aerial and the assistant heard him asking my husband about it. Instead of taking it and selling it to the chap, the assistant stood by while my husband gave it to him. I think the chap felt a bit guilty as he put something in the donation box.

I think if I worked in the shop I'd have done the same. Even an unopened box with anything remotely 'electrical' is a bit of a risk for a charity shop.


I've just read lamb7994's post, which makes some of this redundant, but still. You might be surprised just how much absolute junk does go to charity shops. Things that are broken, damaged beyond use, and all kinds of things. Shops are having to spend money getting junk uplifted.

However, generally, if goods are in working order, in reasonable condition then they'll use them. if they're damaged, chuck it out.

If you think that you'd give it to a friend if they were looking for that kind of thing, donate it. If you definitely wouldn't, the shop probably can't use it.

Lara

tom31 wrote:

We dont accept any electrical items that plug in, e.g kettles, toasters, chargers because we cant test them. Any decent electrical item will get sent to the local furniture exchange for low income families.

Thanks.
Tom.

My local Sue Ryder shop takes electrical items. I took a brand new tea maker in, all boxed and with guarantee, and asked if they would accept it. The lady said yes as they have someone who will test them. I then also handed her some brand new ladies clothes from my Mum which were in a large size together with other items i.e puzzles with "complete" on . The tears that came into her eyes when she said "You don't know what this means to us to have decent items given in".
I felt very humbled by those words and guilty at the same time as I always donate to the local Hospice shop until recently when I saw the ladies going through a bag of items donated and choosing which items they liked and would keep for themselves.
I do realise they are volunteers and possibly this is part and parcel of volunteering. However I would have preferred to see a small amount even if it was 10p go into the till rather than the item go into their bags, or, perhaps I'm wrong? . At the end of the day though without volunteers the shops would close. A difficult one I suppose.

GiveItBack

Actually there are a few shops that take electrical goods, because they have someone that can do the test, it's always worth asking. Thanks for mentioning that Lara.

As for volunteers picking out the good stuff, I'm surprised that the manager lets people do that. I do know of one location where the staff tend to have a look to see if they can use anything directly in their hospice. There's another where the volunteers like to have a rummage, but then get the views of a second for a price to pay for things.

ScoobieGirl

Lara wrote:

...I always donate to the local Hospice shop until recently when I saw the ladies going through a bag of items donated and choosing which items they liked and would keep for themselves.

I think that if this is done a lot they end up taking more than the value of goods as customers will think that they never have any good quality items in there. But as its been said before the volunteers have to deal with a lot and there have to be some perks

ScoobieGirl

GiveItBack wrote:

If you think that you'd give it to a friend if they were looking for that kind of thing, donate it. If you definitely wouldn't, the shop probably can't use it.

I like this! I always had trouble with "Would you buy it?" as the answer was always no! I'm giving it away!

Thanks to everyone for thier posts.