To think people are quite petty to object to charity shop staff getting "first dibs" when they are BUYING the items?

[SorcererGaheris]

For context, I am a volunteer in a charity shop myself, and if I see something that I want, I will purchase it. The shop doesn't give staff discounts, either; staff pay full price - the last item I bought, a book, cost me £40.

Anyway, I COMPLETELY understand people objecting if volunteers were to just take donated items for themselves, but I've seen some online discussions in which people complain about the staff getting first pick of donations when they are paying for them. I really don't see the problem in this case, and think people who object are rather out of line. Other retail workers surely sometime purchase items from the shops they work in, so I don't see why volunteers should be begrudged that. A volunteer is a customer as much as any other.

The shop I volunteer in doesn't sell clothes. It's a bookshop. :)

The thing is the " good " stuff to one person may be completely different to the next person. I wouldn't want the £40 book and they might not want the skinny jeans or whatever so the whole " dibs" thing is a bit of a red herring tbh.

My DD volunteers with a charity shop and all the volunteers are allowed to claim things and pay for them, DD usually calls me (we live just down the road). I can't get people who get annoyed, I'm DDs case they give 4 hours a week in between school work so it's nice to get something of a perk.

The last thing DD bought was a Jelly Cat! It was a cherry one? Anyway it's pay what you like shop, with volunteers they get given a minimum by one of the senior staff and DD paid £5 despite the senior asking for £2.

The shop I volunteer in is an Oxfam bookshop, so we don't sell any clothes at all (though we do sell CDs, vinyl and DVDs as well as Oxfam's New Product range.) The £40 book I paid for would probably not have been to the majority of people's taste, being on the subject of Icelandic magic and witchcraft - not even all witches and occultists would necessarily want it.

I'm not sure on the ethics of this - everyone I know who has volunteered in charity shops has tended to be wealthy or at least comfortable enough to give their time away for free, so is it fair that they get the cream of the crop of donations when they may be able to afford things full price more than the regular clientele can? I realise this is a massive generalisation though, but an interesting question.

Oxfam's new product range is annoying - I don't want my charity shops cluttered up with new products - I go there to buy vintage. Oxfam are not the only offenders here, but I wish charity shops would stop doing this.

How do you encourage people in to buy the rest of the stuff without the good stuff being a bargain? Charity shops work on profits from all items, if the staff are nabbing the best thing, pretty soon it’s filled with standard bric-a-brac you can pick up for a quid at the local school fair. No one will shop there.

Everyone has different views on what the good stuff is. And if you don't give any benefits to the volunteers working there potentially you won't have a charity shop anyway.

I’m a charity volunteer too and that’s our policy - first dibs at the price anyone else would pay,

I did my shift in a charity shop today, we are offered a 25% discount. We have 1 FT paid manager and 1 3/4 time assistant manager. Today volunteers did a stocktake of all clothes in the shop and then removed stuff of a certain date and replenished. That was a few hundred items. Almost 50 donations came in on just one day this week, usually between 10% to 20% of stuff cannot be sold as broken, too stained etc. Plus every electrical item needs pat testing and all games have every single item checked in them, if one piece is missing it has to go in the bin.

I saw things I would have loved to have bought today A regatta winter coat, brand new Kurt Geiger shoes, brand new Clark’s boots, brand new Totes slippers, all the wrong sizes.

The FT manager has to rely on goodwill of the volunteers and people that donate.

One of the volunteers who is in her eighties buys a paperback and jigsaw every week and then donates back the next week. It’s a bit of a joke how much money they make out of her.

Retail is hard work charity sector or not, @MothralovesGojira same here only the paid staff can price items. We have to write each purchase as staff in a record book and sign along with the manager with item and price recorded.

We get quite a few shoplifters in as well which is utterly depressing.

There are usually no more than two volunteers in any charity shop I visit. So you really think they all go home every day with enough stuff to make the shop less attractive?

My Ddad works 5 mornings a week in a charity shop for 0 money. Of course he should have first dibs, mostly it’s the odd game or book for the grand kids he buys and does it really matter who’s £1.50 it is, his or someone else’s????

Hmm. If the volunteers always buy the best stuff, it might be less appealing for other customers to bother coming in regularly.

It’s not like he nabs the designer stuff and flogs on eBay, because it’s a charity shop, in a normal town so even if something if ‘value’ came in he would neither know or care! He certainly wouldn’t buy anything more than a few quid anyway.

One, life is not fair, two the aim of the charity shop is to raise funds for the particular charity, it is not a clothes bank setup, three, many volunteers are elderly/retired and a proportion are neuro divergent, occasionally ex offenders or young people doing DofE etc. Additionally what one person consider the good stuff may not appeal to the next person. Further more people who give up their time are the backbone of charity shops and the ' dibs' obsessed non volunteers could try focusing on this instead.

Clearly that’s not happening because there are 100s of charity shops all doing fine!

The way I see it, a charity shop is primarily there to raise as much money as possible (after overheads, employees' wages, etc) for the cause they're for. So if the charity is getting the same amount of money either way, it doesn't matter who pays for it or what their financial status is.

It seems that some people think that those on minimal incomes should be given priority or favour when it comes to buying from charity shops. While I can understand that way of thinking, it's not really how the shops operate in practice. Charity shops are for ANYONE to buy from, no matter how rich or poor they are. At the shop I volunteer in, you get more than a few middle and upper-middle class people, who can afford to buy new. Since many of the customers can afford to buy new, I don't see how the volunteers can be begrudged buying items.

In my own experience, quite a lot of the volunteers in the shop have been on low incomes themselves. Not all, of course, but a fair amount.

People always talk about the mythical “good stuff” as if that’s easy defined. My “good stuff” is jigsaws for my mum, quality knitting yarn and craft bits, history books and decent quality clothing in a size 14.

I'm not interested in:
children’s clothes
anything too big/small for me to wear
novels
dvds
trendy fashion brands
handbags
jewellery
kids clothes

some people really think we’re all buying “good stuff” we don’t want and don’t need just because we can? As if.

This. My dad has no interest in clothes of any kind, even if something came in his size. He’s got no interest in crockery and the like. He’ll buy the odd book but like mass market fiction, and donates the book back when he’s die with it!
The shop manager loves bits of tut and ornaments, but is plus size so rarely anything comes in clothes size for her… one lady likes to pick up clothes for the grand babies …
There’s 3 PT paid staff in that shop, and a dozen volunteers. Open 6 days a week.
It’s hard work sorting and lifting and checking stock constantly. Without the volunteers the shop absolutely would close.

You seem to be of the belief that volunteers simply purchase all the "good" stuff.

That's not the case. I, and other staff, simply purchase items that we personally like, and sometimes, that is not objectively the best stuff.

The shop I volunteer in has PLENTY of "good stuff" on sale, though opinion might vary over whether they think it's a bargain. Many people think Oxfam is overpriced. The particular shop that I'm at doesn't sell bric-a-brac of any kind either, as we're a bookshop.

I suppose it's because they can charge more for New items, though I realise that that's not what some customers are interested in. Other people may like them, though, so I suppose it balances out. We've found some of the Moomin merchandise, such as the tote bags, to be fairly popular. Other items, perhaps not so much.

I bought some ‘good stuff’ in my dad’s shop - loads of games and books that we can keep at his for visits when we come with the kids.
None of the staff were bothered with the puzzle, the jigsaws, the atlas and comics I bought. They’d all been there ages.
’Good stuff’ is very subjective.
I got a HB history book I wanted to read for years, at £2 instead of £20 and was happy as Larry.in great condition. It had been earmarked to be sent to another shop it has been in that one so long without selling.

I’ve volunteered in three charity shops and in the first there was a definite pecking order as to who got first dibs on the best items. The one I volunteer in now, any purchases are very carefully monitored. So I don’t think you can generalise.

We don't buy all the best stuff, though, we buy the stuff that we personally like and are interested in. Fairly often, what we buy is not actually "the best".

And even when we do buy very nice stuff, the shop I work in has a high volume of good quality donations, so there's no shortage for other customers.

I volunteer in a charity shop. How do you define the best stuff? Size 8 brand new jeans? 2024 paperbacks in excellent condition? Hotter shoes? White stuff skirt? Christmas jumper?
it’s a completely meaningless term.