Are you planning on donating items to charity soon? One charity shop worker has explained why sometimes your donations may be rejected – and it’s not because staff are rude or ungrateful for your efforts.
There’s nothing better than having a clear-out and knowing that you’re going to donate your items to a good cause. However, Stacey, who works in a charity shop and regularly posts thrifting content on her social media, shared that charity shops are not always in a position to take your stuff off your hands.
But this shouldn’t put you off, as there will always be another charity ready and willing to accept your pre-loved goods. Stacey, who posts on TikTok as @queenofpreloved, said that she’d seen someone on social media posting a picture of a board outside a charity shop which said ‘no more donations’.
“I know that the assumption immediately, and I did it myself, is that the charity shop isn’t getting their stock out of the back because the prices on the shop floor are too high, therefore, nothing’s moving, and if only they reduced the prices, the stuff in the back would come out, and they’d have a higher turnover,” Stacey shared. But she personally knows this isn’t the case, and she said it’s “not that black and white”.
Stacey explained that “she’s really lucky” with the shop she manages, saying the atmosphere is great, and they have a lot of hardworking volunteers who are happy to visit every day for a couple of hours and help out. This means that donations can be sifted through effectively from the public and clothing banks.
But, she said, if there weren’t as many volunteers and just staff, it would be impossible to sort through donations, tag them, steam them, and put them out on rails, while also watching the shop floor and taking payments. “So the reason sometimes that they can’t take your donation is they simply don’t have the volunteers, and maybe they don’t have the room,” she explained.
Stacey did say that she understands some charity shops do price highly, and this can cause stock to stagnate, but she said this “is not always down to the staff”.
“Some charity shops have target sheets for brands, and they have to price accordingly,” she said. “It’s out of their hands; it’s not their choice. We don’t have that. My charity shop, we price accordingly what we think, we’re given that responsibility, and we’re happy to take it, because it means we can price to our demographic.”
Stacey explained that they know what “people are willing to pay” in their local area, and their “turnover is great”. She also said people “have to remember” that charity shop staff and volunteers have to “sift through a lot of stuff,” and a lot of stuff has to be “put in rag [piles] because it’s stained, it’s dirty, it’s ripped”.
Stacey also said “dirty bedding” is often donated, and “that rag has to go somewhere in the duration before it’s picked up”. She said it’s “taking up a lot of room” in the back, which sometimes means quality donations have to be rejected.
She continued: “The fast fashion has a lot to answer for, the stuff that people aren’t gonna pay for because it was a £2 top from Shein, so we’ll be lucky if it goes out of our 50p bin. Do you know what I’m saying? So it’s not that black and white.”
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In the comments of the video, another charity shop manager thanked her for making this video, writing: “As a fellow charity shop manager, thanks for this, most people have no idea of the sheer volume of work that goes into it. We sell pretty much all clothes under £5 and it moves quickly, but there’s just not enough staff/volunteers to keep on top of the sheer amount of stuff coming in, around 60 per cent of which is unsellable and takes so much time to sort through.”
Someone else thanked her, saying: “Thank you for saying this. Where I volunteer, there are multiple days each week where the shop manager or sales assistant is on the shop floor all day, with maybe two volunteers through the back.
“One emptying and one steaming. We only have two pens, one of which is for transfer and summer/winter stock although our driver is going to be off for 10 weeks. Then even when we are able to get through donations half of it is for rags or the bin.”