Sorry....but I just have to gloat

jennyjelly

Today I sold a book on Amazon that I bought from a charity shop for £1 about a year ago, and it went for £18, which chuffed me no end. I didn't buy it specifically to sell, but most of my charity shop and boot sale books eventually get recycled that way.

On the 'fairness to charities' subject, my cousin helps as a volunteer at a childrens hospice. They are given loads of stuff to sell in their shop and, being fairly experienced on ebay, he picks through it all before it goes to the shop and sells the good stuff on ebay. This has made thousands for the charity that otherwise would have gone to buyers in the shop.

This is a route open to all charities, and if they choose not to take it they can't feel cheated when someone else sees a valuable item they have missed.

rose_sparky

Touchy subject!

What about the charity shops who auction their valueable donated goods. Do they search out the donors?? I don't think so!

jasmineswhiskers

bella4uk wrote:

I'm pretty sure charity shops have benefitted a lot since the birth of ebay and would welcome us with open arms.

Very true. I never really spent money in them before but now pop in them regularly on the look out for interesting things. And I also buy a few things I keep for myself. Saved myself about £35 only last week on some jeans which were like new, as I was off to town to get some from a dept store and just popped in for a look. So it must be good for all concerned!

Noble_Scarlet

Don't forget you're also paying for the seller's time and 'expertise' even on finding the item you want. I've bought second hand books on eBay (in very good condition too for the prices I paid for) and I dread to think how many charity shops or second hand bookstores I would have had to trawl through to find them - online is so much easier.

I don't have time to sort through the tat to find a gem so I'm not going to begrudge an eBay seller if he/she wants to profit from charity-shop bought items and save me from all that effort!

shampain

Im gonna have my say! You have to think of it the other way round... like one of the posters before me has said people who work in charity shops are more savvy these days... do you think if someone donated something that was very rare and valuable would they inform the person who had donated it?

black-saturn

No they just presume that person knows and just say thanks.

pulliptears

The other point is "some" and Im not saying all, but some workers in charity shops will take out anything half decent and keep it themselves anyway. I knew a lady who would take all manner of things and sell them on ebay. Yes, she did donate, but at a much lower price than the items would have been in the shop.

Its a lucky day to find anything half decent in charity shops these days because the staff have had first pick.

Contains_Mild_Peril

shampain wrote:

Im gonna have my say! You have to think of it the other way round... like one of the posters before me has said people who work in charity shops are more savvy these days... do you think if someone donated something that was very rare and valuable would they inform the person who had donated it?

They'd be unlikely to know who donated it. Most people will give a bag or box of donations rather than a single item, and the shop volunteer will thank them and put it with all the other donations to be sorted, and by the time it's all sorted and priced it would be impossible to match individual donations to their donors.
If I bought a very valuable item from a charity shop and sold it for a fortune, I'd donate some of the money back to the charity, but I don't feel the need to do so if, say, I buy something for £1 and sell it for £10. Chances are I'd spend most of the money in charity shops anyway! I'm quite friendly with the staff at my favourite charity shops, and they know I sometimes sell their stuff on eBay and they're quite happy with that. The clothes I buy are often from the sale rail, which means they've already been in the shop unsold for weeks, and would get sent for recycling if no-one bought them at the reduced price. I once bought a dinner suit for £3 with the intention of selling it on eBay. It was an unusually large size which would probably not have sold in the charity shop otherwise, but they got their £3 and I sold the suit for £62 (much of which I spent on charity shop stuff for myself and my family), and the buyer was happy with it, so everybody wins.

emilyx78

I brought a black ball gown in the sales in jan, for £2 and sold it for £56 plus postage ! got to love ebay ....

ampersand

theatretony wrote:

I once bought a PAYG sim card on eBay for £7.50 and it had £9.50 of credit on it. Then a year later I sold the sim card on eBay and because it had a "gold number", I sold it for £100 !!!! That was the best deal ever for me...

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