to assume chartity shops want to sell their goods?!

[TotorosOcarina]

On the way home from shopping yesterday we passed a charity shop, I spotted 2 things in the window that would look lovely in DDs newly decorated room, so I actully got off the bus about 10 stops early!
I went in and asked how much they are and they said 'nothing in the window is for sale'

I said that surely the stuff in the window was to draw people into buy it? And told them i'd gotoff the bus to get them,

Eventually an elderly lady came out from the back and said to the teenage lad 'let her have them, we can put something else in the window.'

I was just completely confused by this!

They had a sort of shelf display with about 20 items and on the otherside clothes and jewellery, but apparantly non of it was for sale until they changed the window display?!

AIBU to this that is daft?!

How weird!? completely daft.

YANBU...

it is odd. Usually if you see something in the window , you can buy it and they will hold it until the window changes

I can see why they do it after I watched a woman ask the assistant to take five different items out of the window one by one only to then decide she didn't want any of them. The poor woman had to try and put everything back including a jumper on a mannequin

it isn't daft if you have a proper shop and the items in the window are representitive of the stock inside.. it is daft in a charity shop when the items are one offs!

Likeley the teenager just didnt know that though. They are all volunteers and sometimes only work a couple hours a week.

this is quite normal for charity shops, but very annoying. my mum asked about something and they said that it wasn't for sale, but 2 weeks later, it had been sold. Perhaps they are waiting for someone to go in and offer them a lot of money when they're told it's not for sale.

The charity shops in my home town all did this - they had signs up saying that items in the window would only be for sale from xxx date.

I think in small towns they don't have actual members of staff, only volunteers, so someone travels around all the shops in the area to do their window displays, so the things in the window only go on sale after the next window display change - thye can't take things out of the window because it'll leave a blank area that none of the volunteers are allowed to fill, or aren't confident to fill, or aren't physically able to fill, so it will stay unitl the person who does the windows is back in a few weeks..

Its not the case with the c harity shops in the city where I live now - there you can go in and ask for things from the window

I used to give all our stuff to charity shops but heard that many dodgy reports one way or another that I now either recycle them at places I know they will get some use or for DS's clothes I take them to our local SureStart centre where they are so grateful and they get to go to really needy children who have nothing.

Bathsheba
That is it too. I agree
the ladies in our local oxfam would not be able to get in or out of the window if their lives depended on it. They are not over flowing with staff at the best of times and if someone was poncing about in the window for 20 mins that would not be helpful

They are trying to make stores more profitable and professional ( in the Mary Portas stylee) and getting stuff shoved in randomly but volunteers isn't going to help that.

When I worked in a small store we could take things out of the window for customers because we had a window dresser on site.

I think suggesting that volunteers are cynically holding off to a better price is neither realistic nor very charitable