Am I being unreasonable to be mad as hell about a scam going on at this charity shop?

[Bunpea]

Am I being unreasonable to think there is a scam going on at a local charity shop?

I took three bags of things to my local charity shop for a well-known mental health charity. My OH took the bags in to the shop at the front. The bags contained ‘good’ stuff (mainly nice clothes, with some new bedding still in the cellophane wrappers). All good enough to have sold on eBay, but I want to support this charity.

The shop has a car park round the back you can pull in to. I drove round there to turn around and wait for OH.
In the car park was a man sorting through boxes and bags of goods, putting some things into three large zip-up shopping bags, and everything else he put in a skip.
Into the skip went lots of kids toys which looked in great condition - plastic ride-ons, a small dolls house, soft toys, toy cars, as well as books and other stuff. He kept testing the weight of the bags - presumably he was taking them somewhere.
He seemed uncomfortable that I was there, lit a cigarette, picked up a few random pieces of small litter (but did nothing about the bigger mess) and generally hung around.

Just as OH appeared at the side of the car, the shop manageress opened the back door of the shop and handed the man one of my bags.
I got out and asked her if the stuff I had donated was no use to them, that I was never sure what was useful to donate, and if it was no good would take it back and deal with it another way.
She hastily grabbed the bag back from the man, saying it was ‘being taken upstairs to be sorted’ (no it wasn’t), and that ‘we sell it all’.
Hmmmm.

I can understand that charity shops probably use dealers for disposing of some goods they can’t sell, and that some stuff goes for rags. Or that they move stock from shop to shop. But this didn’t look like that. And all the good stuff that had gone in that skip…
Am I being unreasonable to be mad as hell about a scam going on at this charity shop?

I was going to post as I have worked in a charity shop as well. But you covered mostly everything.

I do remember years ago asking about why the quality of items were better in one area than another, and the volunteer of that shop told me they were able to charge more in certain areas and therefore sold their better-quality items there. I have no idea if this is true though across the board, seem like a lot of hassle to me for not much return.

And yes, they sell on ebay etc.

When I worked at the sorting warehouse we were allowed to choose items we wanted to buy and put them to one side. And yes, we got them at a cheaper price than they would have been listed at in the shop. I bought items I wanted though. Would not have bought items to sell on at a profit.

A lot of stuff offered to charity shops by people that think it's valuable or worth something, is absolute tat.

Bur equally, a lot of charity shops don't have the expertise or knowledge to recognise or value items that are worth something.

I occasionally watch the eBay YouTubers who scour charity shops and car boots for items to sell on- I genuinely have no idea how they do it when every charity shop I venture into seems to just have either racks of used Primark clothes still at Primark prices or stuff from C&A back in the 80s, filthy rotten leatherette sofas and jigsaws, plus the odd IKEA pan.

The clothes I donate I would like to be given for free to those who really need them- how am I best to do this?

Contact your local homeless shelter

The volunteers took all the best stuff for themselves.

the problem I have with this claim is... who has a house big enough? Are the pilferers all horrendous hoarders? I almost never buy anything & I'm drowning in too much stuff to look after. If I worked somewhere with lots of "good stuff" constantly coming under my nose & took "the best stuff" for myself... what would I do with my old stuff? And clothes specifically: most clothing doesn't fit me or is wrong style. Doesn't fit anyone in my household. So then the problem is, most of the "best stuff" isn't actually better than what I already have, or I couldn't find a use for it. I sell a lot of things on ebay for charity: it's hard work, hard to make a profit worth my time. So selling on mostly is a bad business model.

I am being put off donating any items again to charity after reading this thread, fwiw. Sounds like there's no point unless it's BNWT and would otherwise retail brand new for at least £20.

Really?
Scammers the world over would dearly love to have you representing them.

I work for a charity shop and absolutely NOTHING goes to waste. We bin very very little. Even tatty/dirty clothes are piled up and the rag man comes and takes it and we get paid for that. Any oddments or bits of random things go into big rummage baskets for 10-20p. It all goes!
So no idea what was going on here.

my Friend volunteering in a charity shop said all the staff got first pick for … free to take anything home. Most stuff worth something was sold specialist etc
I offer free on local wa group now and then tip

The volunteers in this shop took nice stuff home for free eg John Lewis coat brand new but ebayed it not for the charity but themselves or gave it away as Xmas presents etc

I tried to donate a big box of toys (many unopened Xmas gifts and still in packaging) recently and was told they end up throwing most of it away as they now have to have the British safety standard CE mark on it all. I got the impression they couldn't be arsed sorting through it all but I didn't want to throw it away so I went through it all myself with the lady watching, it all had the CE mark on so she took it it I've no idea if it just got chucked out anyway!

Charity shops get far more than they can sell - I used to work in one and loads of stuff was just chucked away (I'd say about 60%). There was always a back room absolutely chock full of stuff which was impossible to sort through and also we sold very little despite being in a busy, affluent town where you would think bargain hunters would head.

This is true as well - you also got a staff discount!

I worked for a small charity for quite a few years. The waste was really one of the things that got to me, manager would bin things she didn't like, if she fancied a change of everything on the bric-a-brac shelves, everything would be cleared off and binned and then there were the rules of no rummage boxes, no toys to be sold without European safety marks so some beautiful handmade wooden toys got binned. I know I was made fun of in the staff room because I was into recycling everything possible, I used to take cardboard, etc home to go in my recycling bin rather than it go to landfill.

Once I'd got manager status, I could do a bit more so things like lovely wooden toys would get offered to playgroups. Towels and blankets were saved for animal rescues. Any clearance of bric was offered to someone who worked with the homeless and helped them set up when they were starting anew in a flat or needed something they couldn't afford. I'm convinced people would rather have their donations used and not go to landfill.

But surely donors realise that?

Why not? That sounds like a very efficient way of turning over good quality stock. I assume he deals in vintage stuff so he pays the charity shop a reasonable sum that enables him to make a profit, meanwhile the charity shop has had a quick turnover, has made money on donated goods but hasn’t had to get things cleaned/ buttons sewn on, zips mended, hems sewn, hasn’t taken the risk of stock being stolen or “damaged” by crafty shoppers , hasn’t had to spend time storing, sizing, labelling and displaying goods. The charity shop gets a fast profit and turnaround. If the shop regularly gets high quality donations there will still be good stuff on their rails because the vintage dealer will be picky about what he takes. The sad truth is that people will pay more in a vintage shop than they will in a charity shop, so the amount the shop has been paid is probably fairly similar to the amount they would have had to charge to get a sale.

You’d think so. And even if not, as PP said, once you’ve donated stuff, it’s no longer your decision what happens to it.

Donating stuff to a charity shop is, for most people, an alternative to taking it to the tip, ie it’s just a feel-good way to throw stuff away. So if it ends up in landfill anyway, what’s the difference?

Obviously, like most people, I hate waste but sadly most of us have way more stuff than we really need and this is the result. 🤷🏼‍♀️

OP this is AIBU any views expressed on here are not necessarily those of the people posting them.

I volunteer for a big charity and can say absolutely that volunteers do not get stuff for free, or even a discount, but if they want something, pay the same that any other customer would pay (and pricing guides are clear and strict). A sale by one staff/volunteer member to another is recorded separately with receipt and individuals named.

Charities do receive very many more donations than they can manage, and people do look on them as recycling points (especially when local authorities don't provide comprehensive kerbside collections for textiles, toys, household goods). Some donors understand what is likely to sell and sort their donations carefully. Most don't. Some people can't bear to put their own items in the recycling, and will bring stuff that they know, really, won't sell - books that have fallen in the bath and been dried out for example!

So well-organised charities do the following:
prioritise donations that will generate revenue for the charity - good quality, gift-aided, seasonal, and that will earn its place on limited shelf space.
cascade good donations that there is either no current room for or that have had their turn in that particular branch (2-4 weeks, or even a few days) to branches with fewer donations, or organisations like local book exchanges that can use small donations
put into proper recycling services that pay according to living wage guides and which guarantee to dispose of/recycle properly with no landfill dumping.

sell on to third parties by weight (We Buy Any Book and similar) - this is not generally approved of by HQs, but sometimes, is the only way to

I"ve no idea, OP, what you were witnessing. Might be legit, might not be. The shop manager who hastily backed off putting your donation into the skip might have been concealing a scam, or might have been avoiding confronting a donor with the reality of cascading/recycling/onward selling by the charity. Because some donors really don't like the idea that there just isn't a market for their donated goods, or at least, not one via the shop floor of the charity to which they have just taken the trouble to bring items.

I would follow up with HQ, and insist on a response to what they find.

When mam died all her beautiful clothes were taken washed and pressed/ dry-cleaned to a cancer charity in bulk. We pre-organised this. The thought of them being taken to landfill / sold on ebay for someone else's profit makes me really upset.

On another note, everything I donate (shelter/ family centre/ uniform collection) is washed and ironed/ folded nicely and organised in type. I think it's only right that it's done this way- give things in a way you'd like to receive them.

My mum works for a charity shop. They get given so much it is impossible to store it all in the shop.

Clothes that are a bit tatty or not worth a lot (primark etc) they often take to get cash for clothes from the weights of bags for the charity

They also send a lot of things to a huge warehouse to be sorted and redistributed to their other charity shops

Imagine they do get a lot of junk for the skip but not sure why they’re putting good things in there, maybe they were damaged or missing parts on closer inspection 🤷🏼‍♀️

If you are worried I would ask the manager in a non-confrontational way ☺️ They work hard for pittance! Xxx

This is how the charity shops I know work. Staff can only buy things if they notify the manager, the manager approves and the items have been on the shop floor display for a certain length of time. Sadly much of the stuff brought in is unsellable and the charity spends a huge amount having to dispose of it. We have had to stop accepting furniture because of storage costs ( and most of it was rubbish) . People still think we are overjoyed to see bags of videos, ancient electrical items, broken dirty and damaged toys ( “ oh someone will love this grubby teddy with a missing ear”) , baby mattresses, car seats, scooters, piles of junk you have had stored in your damp garage for twenty years, your dead dogs bed and all the other stuff you can’t be arsed to take down to the tip.

To be honest, look at the donation before you bring it in. If it is stuff that you honestly wouldn’t be willing to buy and bring into your house then find somewhere else for it.

Thanks for responses, and the idea of selling my stuff on eBay etc and then donating the money. I’m going to do this as much as I can from now on.

It has really wound me up, shady mean people and their grasping avarice cheating some of the most unfortunate people of money that could help them, and exploiting the goodwill of naive people like me. Dismaying to hear this is far from isolated incident. Charities should get a better handle on this - they need to be better run.

The other thing that winds me up is the thought of perfectly reusable stuff going to landfill. Grrrrrrr.

But how is it a scam when you don't have to donate to charity in the first place?

I've had a few very bad experiences and now give stuff away on Freecycle instead.

I used to live above a charity shop, also a well known mental health charity. They had a large commercial waste bin that was left open at the back. I'd often look to see what they chucked. I was disgusted at all the good stuff they discarded. I understand strict rules about toys. But the shop seemed to sell only clothes (80%) and a few books and CDs. Almost everything else was thrown away.

I remember seeing some Beatrix Potter Wedgewood mugs and lots of other really good stuff that was definitely saleable; it just didn't fit their niche.

There was a larger local hospice shop a few yards away. They could have easily offered the best stuff to them. It really set me against them.

Many of the 'big chain' charity shops now seem more commercially focused on quite a narrow range of goods. Presumably, the most profitable lines. Whereas the more 'local' shops still have a wider range of bric-a-brac and whatever people donate. Those are the ones I support.

Next time you're in a charity shop, ask yourself: Is this really the only stuff that people would have donated to this shop? If not, ask yourself: What happened to all the other well intentioned, generous donated goods?