Or have I just come up with a genius way for charities to make some money?

[geniusideaforcharity]

Charities have loads of old clothes
Schools have loads of dress up days. Why can't there be a charity eBay which makes the dress up day stuff into outfits (eg y6 evacuee) and then sells to save from landfill

Saves little Timmy and little Johnny arriving in Amazon prime duplicates as all would be a bit different surely

I know the time would be huge but it would be so good

Because dress up days don’t happen very often per year. Where would they store the stuff?

edited as I exaggerated massively

What? The dress up days tend to be themed. On what planet would an evacuee want to be a dragon?
Just send them normal clothes.

People buy from Amazon etc because it’s cheap, convenient, and offers fast delivery. Most charity retail arms rely on volunteers and don’t always have enough of those available to meet the demand of coordinating an online shopping and distribution service which would rival what Amazon etc offer. Some charities do use online platforms to get a wider audience for their higher value donations where it makes sense, but it makes less sense for low value children’s clothing.

You think someone would go all that free, in the name of charity??

My volunteers (I run a baby and child charity shop) are generally over 75 and I am not up
To the task of explaining the ebay and vinted concepts to them, nor the importance of well laid out and lit photos and descriptions, pricing structure, weighing and assessing for postage etc.

that’s after I’ve researched and explained about every single connotation of a school and nursery dress up day.

And then there’s the outfits and uproar as we included something from shein or Primark. The fact the evacuee outfit isn’t right for x culture and are we trying to make a political statement by having such a thing…

then I have to buy a load of cheap plastic one use bags (we can’t afford fancy paper or biodegradable goodies) for postage and start sending things and making extra trips to post offices and delivery centres.

all this taking us away from opening the shop doors, sorting the donations, dressing the shop and serving the customers.

whilst a good idea - I think you’ll all have to stick to trawling charity shops, vinted and Amazon. Sorry!

ps also sorry for the grumpy tone. I want to do so much more but the shop itself and recruiting volunteers etc wipes us out!

My kids primary school pta did this, they put together loads of outfits for book day, Victorian day, Christmas jumpers etc and then sold or loaned them to parents

People who make costumes for a living probably sell them on Etsy.
Whether they source clothes to use from charity shops I couldn't tell you.
A lot of parents already buy clothes from charity shops for costumes.
I'm not sure exactly what your idea is.
Who is making the costumes in your scenario?

YANBU but you’re also not very commercially minded.

A much simpler solution would be for school to accept donations of eg Halloween dresses, sell them on to next group of parents and donate the £ to charity

Definitely but most charities don't want any childrens stuff so won't be likely to try it

Our PTA does a fundraiser where early in October they ask parents to donate old costumes which are then sold to the children for a couple of pounds. Rinse and repeat.

Maybe suggest it to your school PTA, so items bought from amazon etc. can be donated and swapped or resold to next year's students doing the evacuee topic. Works for xmas jumpers too.

The vast amount of donations are women clothes, I think weight loss and gain plus actual fashion reasons and not because they need them means they have a bigger turnover. DH wears t.shirts he wore at University, he is retiring next week! We get quite a few small baby clothes as they grow so quickly. We do not get children’s clothes or men’s clothes in any way the same amount of volume.

I am a decent enough seamstress and have made many a costume, even a full set of armour out of Eva foam that took 50 hours. When I used to make costumes for world book day and stuff at primary school I used to buy secondhand clothes for the material. The amount of work for some costumes is a lot.

I agree that this is impractical on a national scale, because of the time required and postage and packing costs, which isn't free, despite Amazon and eBay making people believe it is.

However, I think schools should do more to reuse dress up day costumes, Christmas jumpers etc on a local level. Parents could donate outgrown versions to be sold for a token £1 an item/costume at school fairs, or even just have a rack if there's space, a bit like those charity bookcases you see in supermarkets.

Stuff gets reused, people get to buy things cheaply and money is raised for school funds, so a winner all round.