Charity Shops!!!!!! bah humbug

tifnstav

I work for a hospital charity and dread "The Jumble". You want to scrub your entire body with wire wool and stardrops afterwards.
Knickers, Y Fronts, broken glass, basques, stained dribbled-on pillows!
Some people do think that donating to a charity shop/jumble sale is a way of avoiding overloading their bin when they only get collected fortnightly!
But the majority of people are doing a good thing and donations (whatever they are) should always be graciously accepted.

rose_sparky

tifnstav wrote: »

I work for a hospital charity and dread "The Jumble". You want to scrub your entire body with wire wool and stardrops afterwards.
Knickers, Y Fronts, broken glass, basques, stained dribbled-on pillows!
Some people do think that donating to a charity shop/jumble sale is a way of avoiding overloading their bin when they only get collected fortnightly!
But the majority of people are doing a good thing and donations (whatever they are) should always be graciously accepted.

<< toddles off to investigate stained dribbled on pillows and wonders if they can compete with well worn shoes >>

tsharp

Bad charity shop moment;

All books were £1, and there was a complete series of 6 sci fi novels that i read as a kid and wanted to buy, but wasn't too impressed with £6 for them, so i asked if it would cost £6 to buy the whole series (ie asking for £4/5 for the lot). The fat imbred behind the counter just replied it would be £6, as if she didn't really understand the question. Usually nice old ladies run these places, this particular shop has a monosylabic Dingle ramily reject oozing behind the counter. Charity shops are not the place for bargaining, so i left it at that.

Good charity shop moment;
I bought another rare 1962 comic for £1.99. I'll look forward to ebaying that bad-boy!

arkonite_babe

I worked as a manager for a charity shop and one of my worst moments has to be opening a bag of donated goods to find a lovely dirty nappy right in the middle of everything :eek: :eek:

It never ceased to amaze me how much rubbish, personal details etc was left in among the donations. But the volunteers and I always gave everyone who brought goods in a big smile and a thankyou. No excuse for bad manners!

Contains_Mild_Peril

rose_sparky wrote: »

<< toddles off to investigate stained dribbled on pillows and wonders if they can compete with well worn shoes >>

Not too sure about the pillows, but I did once make a nice profit on some vintage nylon Y-fronts (used but, thankfully, clean) bought from a jumble sale.

rls1973

love this charity shop thread

i used to love the charity shop trawl and could spend all day browsing,and used to regularly donate as well. but lately, i've about given up.

it's far too expensive now, can' believe i'm saying that, but unless it's a designer label, some of them are asking £5 for a t-shirt for example, when new ones are available for about £3.

i tended to use the one that's easy to get to on the school run - it begins with O - but i've been snapped at that many times, i can't be doing with it

"oh, if you must" (pardon me for donating)

"hmmph, it's not just all your rubbish is it?" (er, actually i'm going to the tip after this, so if you want anything taking there............)

"well i don't know where we're going to put it all" (here's a suggestion......)

Nowadays, I always use the SCOPE shop, (as you can see from my signature, it's closer to my heart anyway)
which is staffed by lovely volunteers, like has already been said you don't want a medal, but just a quick thanks as they take the bag from you is good.


Failing that, i use that metal bin thingy that SCOPE have in supermarket carparks, it's next to the recycle bins: so it's good even for when the shop's shut.

Can't believe what people are saying about dribbly pillows and bloodstained eiderdowns etc:eek: (but then again,whenever i use a public toilet, i can never imagine what some people do at home:D ) i always wash anything i'm giving away, what are some people like:eek:


a bit sad, but here's what charity shops can be/used to be like: over 20 years ago now, my mum used to volunteer in a charity shop. it was well-publicised that there had been a double murder locally. the mother of one the victims rang up and asked them to come and collect all her daughter's clothes and possessions,lock stock and barrel. (she said she just needed it out of the house, which is understandable). no-one questioned this, or gave the lady attitude, they just collected it 'wholesale' and then sorted through it for her later, no questions asked.

lizballymena

Charity shop near me dumps about half the stuff they get given to them. this includes toys, books delph. If they dont like the look of the stuff it goes to the local skip. I know as my mate works for them (no payment of course)

looby-loo_2

Worst
Iwandered into my local charity shop and started looking in the box of bits and pieces on the table. A voice roared out to stop looking in there at once. I took no notice as, after all, things stacked up on the table in a charity shop - what could be wrong? The assistant then jumped from round the back of the counter and grabbed the box, saying I wasn't allowed to look because it wasn't sorted yet! She wouldn't even let me ask the price of one item. I asked when it would be sorted. She didn't know. I popped back a few times and never saw any of the pieces for sale. They were all branded china (spode, wedgwood etc. so I expect they ended up on ebay - lets hope for the charity although I didn't see them during the following 3-4 weeks)

Best
Virtually new Next designer embroidered jeans for my daugher which still retail at £50 marked at £5 but the assistant let her have them for £2.50 because they looked a bit 'shabby'.

pseudopensioner

Glad the thread is still going and pleased to see I'm not the only person to have faced a less than helpful assistant.

The PC is now being switched off for packing................yes, I'm stillpacking and the removal van will be here at 6am:eek:

BT willing, I'll be back sometime soon.

Bye for now folks:)

Contains_Mild_Peril

tsharp wrote: »

Bad charity shop moment;

All books were £1, and there was a complete series of 6 sci fi novels that i read as a kid and wanted to buy, but wasn't too impressed with £6 for them, so i asked if it would cost £6 to buy the whole series (ie asking for £4/5 for the lot). The fat imbred behind the counter just replied it would be £6, as if she didn't really understand the question. Usually nice old ladies run these places, this particular shop has a monosylabic Dingle ramily reject oozing behind the counter. Charity shops are not the place for bargaining, so i left it at that.

Some of them seem to take it personally if someone tries to haggle. I also had a bad experience with a manager who evidently didn't (and didn't want to) understand what I was saying. She had such a sour face I wouldn't even have approached her in the first place, but she saw fit to intervene when I was having a polite and friendly conversation with one of the volunteers.
There was a sign saying that books were 20p each or 4 for £1. Since it had no smiley, exclamation mark or other indication of irony, I quietly asked the assistant if she was aware of the anamoly. It turned out she hadn't noticed, and we had a smile about it, then a fierce old hag stormed up to us and demanded to know what the problem was. I calmly explained that there was no problem, I had merely mentioned that the figures on the sign didn't add up (unless, of course, it were intended to penalise multiple purchases), to which she responded "Some people expect to get them for nothing!"
I tried to explain that she had misunderstood and I was not saying that the books were overpriced at all, but she instructed me to "Just don't say anything". When I tried again to clear up the misunderstanding, she still wasn't listening, and huffed that if I wasn't happy I should leave. I hadn't been unhappy with anything until she came along, but I could see I was wasting my breath, and I'd been on my way out anyway, so I left.
A few days later, I was about to make a purchase from the same shop when she shouted "I thought I asked you not to come back?!" She'd said no such thing (at least not within my earshot, and she had a voice like a foghorn), so I pointed out - politely - that that wasn't what she'd said. She insisted she had, and barred me from the shop.
When I asked for contact details for the charity to which the shop belonged, she claimed to be in charge of the charity itself (I later discovered this to be untrue).
The shop closed down after a few months, probably because the manager's attitude drove the customers away, which was a real shame because it was a great little shop and everyone else who worked there was lovely.