So what would you tell a charity shop manager?

[Supersimpkin]

I volunteer in a charity shop and want to hear it from the horse's mouth - ie the customers. Colour blocking - yay or nay? Prices? Boutique or rag-and-bone decor?

Am feeling smug as anything as have just won an award for volunteering, so let rip, I can't be offended by anything right now.

I no longer go into charity shops that colour block. I don’t want to find something I love only to find it isn’t my size. I don’t want to look through 50 items to find the size I want I want to look through 15 in my size range to see if there is anything I like.

There is another thread on this

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3540978-To-hate-colour-blocked-charity-shops

Some prices are ridiculous. Primark tops priced more expensive than they are new! ensuring donations are checked too. I once bought a jigsaw that had ALL the edge pieces missing. I will never buy a charity jigsaw again, would have taken someone 2 mins to count the pieces.

I’m not a fan of boutique - it is what it is. I don’t want to feel I can’t look around or pick stuff up in case I ruin the display.

Please realise that you need to price to shift stuff - turnover is better than achieving top moolah - why because people will come in more regularly giving you a bigger wider customer base - throughput is what makes a good Charity Shop - I hate going in a few weeks after the last visit and its the same overpriced stuff

Have a real bargain bucket bit 10p an item or something - especially with kids toys or books that don't shift. This helps parents out enormously especially if the reason they are in there is low income

By size or by colour, I don't care. But I do object to clothes being overpriced. And no boutique look please, it makes browsing really uncomfortable. It should be fun rummaging for a good deal, not feel like you're being watched and too scared to knock stuff over, or hang back in the wrong place.

Window displays can be lovely, but one of our local shops is unnecessarily precious about them. If you see something in the window you have to return to purchase it the next week so as not to spoil the display. It's like they don't want to sell stuff.

Agree on the crammed racks. If I can't move stuff about to see items then I'll just walk away. Trying to wrestle a hanger out while it attaches itself to 47 other hangers and almost pulls over a rail will have me leave the shop. It just reeks of "can't be arsed, don't care". I know storage can be an issue though.

No colour blocking.

Yes pop some things on mannequins but don't be pissy if someone wants the item from a mannequin.

Keep shoes/handbags/kitchen items/bric a brac all in their own areas. We have one that has vases and glasses dotted around the shoes and clothing rails. Sets my teeth on edge knowing I'll probably be the fool to knock something over.

Realistic pricing. Some around here think £40 for an old well used Zara coat is acceptable.

Making sure stuff is on the right hangers. It's really annoying to flick through, find a size 16 hanger and it's got a size 8 top on it. If that's a faff, just don't have sizes on the hangers at all

I bought a jacket last week and found a big rip in it..even the bin man left it!

By size please, lovely lady.

Sorry,off the point? Size grading for me.

Agree with the gift aid pressure. The sales assistant can be really snotty if you say you don't pay tax. Also need to know makes, I've seen primark stuff priced more than new.

I don't mind colour blocking tbh.

That said I rarely go in for a specific item-just a general look around to see if I fancy anything.

Train the volunteers to smile, say thanks for donations and be generally pleasant. I don't expect copious praise for bringing in donations but I also don't like being tutted at for not knowing my Gift Aid number

This. I want my taxes to go to the govt and not be re-claimed by the charity (is that how it works?).

Also volunteering fills a need in the volunteer so they shouldn't act like they're doing me a favour.

Books - sell 'em cheap and I'll buy a pile and donate them back when read. I don't want to pay £1.99+ for a paperback.

Separate Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror and Young Adult fiction.
Agree about authors in alphabetical order.
Don't use those awful rotating racks with 4 paperbacks on top of each other in little pockets so you can't read the spines. Very irritating.

Don't ram clothes together on rails, so it's hard to get at them.
Colour blocking does look nicer, but do sizes as well.

Agree about training staff to use electronic equipment; this includes tills. Sometimes purchases take so long, it gives you second thoughts about using the shop again. Yes, I know they're volunteers...

Keep prices realistic. Paperbacks shouldn't cost more than £1.
Agree with the bric-a-brac and clothing pricing comments, too.

Rotate stock frequently.
Have a jumble box and a dressing up box, as well as a designer rail and a curio case. Sometimes you just need something less pristine or a bit weird...
Agree about not cluttering up the place with plastic give away crap and dilapidated or sticky books.
Do whatever it takes to avoid that odour...

Window displays can be lovely, but one of our local shops is unnecessarily precious about them. If you see something in the window you have to return to purchase it the next week so as not to spoil the display. It's like they don't want to sell stuff.

I forgot about this!!! It bugs me so much. Yes it's lovely that you have a pretty window display at Christmas etc but why are you so precious over not selling these items. I genuinely once saw a Christmas tree in a shop window that said (items in the window will be available to purchase after the 30th December).

Now I understand people buy Christmas decorations in the sales after Christmas but no one goes actively looking in charity shops for a tree when Tesco has slashed theirs to sell. Surely the store would have been better to sell it to someone before they closed for Christmas so a family, school or Nursing home etc could have made good use of it.

Organise adult clothes by type and size. So a 'women's jeans' rail, then a 'women's tops' rail, each organised in size order, is fine.

Children's clothes by size. Maybe a separate 'party outfit / fancy dress' rail, with mixed sizes, if there aren't heaps of those things. Makes a nice feature too (and attracts children in, provides pester power!).

As a previous poster said, don't put rubbish on the shelves such as free cds from papers, McDonalds toys, mugs that easter eggs have been in. Over pricing, I fully understand that the charity is in it to make money, however most people go in to be able to clothe themselves cheaply though circumstance not choice, and therefore prices should reflect that, surely it is better to get it on the shelves, sold and replaced asap so there is not lots of stock stored in back rooms?

Sorted by size and type. I can see the colour from a distance without any help at all. :) Space between racks so you can browse. No items which turn out to be sun-damaged from being in the window for years. Don't mix second-hand items with new items, e.g. your own brand scarves or badges (keep them in different areas). Nice and clean and as fresh-smelling as possible.

Deffo size. Please. I am fed up of not seeing a size on a piece.

I went in one shop in Chiswick and was asking how I can tell what size it was but they were more interested in talking about where they were going to lunch. Pretensious pair - (?Spelling) should have worked in an art gallery!

I shop by colour

Colour blocking only makes sense in a shop if you have multiple sizes of something.

If I go up to you and ask if you have this three year old shirt from Primark in another size you will wonder if I am mad. For a reason.

So please no. It's particularly horrendous for a plus size person as I have to go through every section to look at the one thing in my size.

In fact. Do whatever you want but have a plus size section. Make my life easier.

Our local chazzer is frequently unable to take donations due to volume, yet the store is gradually filling up with new - not donated - stock that the charity itself buys to sell. Don't fill the shelves with bought in crap and knock back donations!

Don't try and sell wash worn bobbly primark clothes for more than they cost new. Don't cram a million things onto the rails. Don't bother trying to sell anything really tatty (stained and bobbled Asda baby vests for example). Try and avoid the musty charity shop smell but also don't smell like glade plug ins.

Oh yes, gift aid!

It's a stupid, ridiculously admin-heavy system and should be reformed. In the meantime, please ensure all staff and volunteers understand that falsely claiming gift aid is fraud.

Gift aid can only be claimed by doners who pay income tax in the same tax year. Doing so when you know you're not going to be paying tax is fraud. Lots of SAHMs, part-time low-earners and pensioners - so charity shop core customers - will not be paying any income tax. They CANNOT sign up for gift aid.

Customers don't necessarily know this. They can feel pressured by shop staff / vols asking, to 'do the right thing', without understanding the implications.

I have had to explain this to National Trust vols, who really should know better and do have to say 'sorry I can't as a I don't pay tax at the moment' to spell it out clearly for, often bemused-looking, shop volunteers.

We had this discussion about colour blocking last week....

The problem by size is that sizes are not consistent. If we put all size 14 clothes together, we'd get people moaning that a size 14 from M&S is huge, but they can't get even one leg into a size 14 from H&M. Lots of people cut labels off their clothes so we have to guess the size anyway.

Also, most big charity shop chains are pretty clued up when it comes to maximising revenues, managers get sales figures broken down in every way imaginable. If colour blocking wasn't profitable - or if arranging by size was more profitable - that's what they'd be doing.

We have to ask about gift aid - it's another 25% on top of sales price which makes a massive difference. None of the volunteers I work with gives anyone attitude about it though, it's a simple "are you a taxpayer" question and if they say no, that's fine. Nothing to get in a huff about.

The main problem is that most charity shops have one paid member of staff. Ours does 36 hours a week, the shop is open 52 hours a week. She has to do everything from recruiting new volunteers, health and safety training, attending area meetings, window displays, paperwork, banking, all the compliance stuff, ordering new product, liaising with other stores to send our excess stuff to them. And that's before she gets to the daily stuff of making sure the store looks OK and filling shelves. She just doesn't have time to do loads of training with all new volunteers, some of whom do a couple of shifts and the fall off the radar again.

Obviously there's no point in pricing too high and things not selling. But on the other hand it's the job of the charity to maximise revenue. We know our customers are happy to pay £2.49 for a paperback. It was £1.99, the prices went up at the start of the year, the figures show there has been no impact on sales. Same with clothes, our customers will pay more for Boden/Hobbs/Cos than they will for M&s or Zara. But again the manager isn't omnipresent and simply cannot be there to oversee every pricing decision - she just draws up the pricing guidelines and has to trust volunteers to stick to them. But mistakes happen.

I despise colour blocking, by size makes so much more sense! And the very expensive stuff - why? Why £4.99 for a faded bobbly old top? Everyone goes to the local cheapest one near me - high turnover of clothes etc, always busy.