Why do charity shops...

[LemooonSlice]

...keep items as "display only" ? A piece of furniture for the shop I can understand, or a window prop, that's used each year. But 2 charity shops local to me have a Christmas tree in the shop (easily accessible) decorated with a random assortment of ornaments, and customers are not allowed to buy the baubles. If they were a matching set fair enough, keep them together. But they are a random assortment and the charity loses income and goodwill because they are displaying things in the window and shop that customers can't buy. I genuinely don't understand the logic! This is not a dig at the shop volunteers, who do a great job (and I have done it myself)

I can understand why you're a bit put out but you don't go into other non-charity shops and expect to buy bits of their Christmas displays do you? You know like those nice window hangers or garlands around the windows in most shops?
We have a fold up chair that which customers sit on to try shoes on, plate stands, wooden clothes hangers, book stands etc which in our charity shop are 'our' items that help us sell goods that customers want and display at best advantage.
A Christmas tree is the same thing - it's a prop to entice customers in to buy just like other retailers do. Why is a charity shop so different? Your reasoning is a bit bonkers to be honest.

Wtf what a weird attitude. They can't display their own Christmas decorations? If a staff member had their coat hung up on a peg near the till would you demand to buy that too?

or, even worse, ask if you could swap it for a coat you had at home.

No not me and I wouldn't do that. The tree (which I thought was being used as a bauble mannequin) is in the shop next to all the other Christmas items for sale, hence my confusion.

Yes and happy to be corrected.

I wasn't affronted, I was just confused and asked here so as not to be difficult to the staff!

Can you tell us about these baubles? They sound a bit special.

What's so special about these particular ornaments you're so interested in? Can you buy them elsewhere?

Most shops have Christmas decorations that aren't on sale to customers.

You don't expect to be able to buy every single thing you see in a regular shop.

The display might have been designed/ curated even if it looks random.

They might be particular ornaments set aside by the larger organisation for decorating the stores.

🙄

Also if they let people buy ornaments of the tree, then the tree will be gradually stripped of its decorations throughout December.

There might be certain staff (or the manager) who is good at visually putting a display together, and others who will just ram the decorations on any old place.

So even if they have spare ornaments, they might not look right if they are replaced by other staff, or they might not "go", or they might not be able to guarantee an endless supply of replacement ornaments.

Retailers think carefully about their Christmas displays and charity shops are no different.

It would be a bit of a nightmare for a shop to have a constantly changing Christmas display.

@Monty27 You have reminded me that back in the Stone Age when I was a child, our local department store used to put their window decorations in the January Sale! They were very much coveted, people used to make a beeline for that area as soon as the store opened on Sale Day, my DM included. We had several decorations ( kept from year to year in The Christmas Box in the loft) from them.

Thank you for that memory. ☺️

you’re just being flippant and unhelpful. a charity shop is well a charity shop and you expect everything to be for sale 🤷🏽‍♀️

@Riverswims 🤔 um....nope. That's not how charity retailing works. If you want an 'everything must go's vibe then you probably need to lower your expectations and go to a local jumble sale.

Because it's to decorate the window, they may belong to staff even. Don't you like nicely decorated windows?

I love the big hanging Christmas decorations that my local Waitrose has up, I can’t be annoyed they won’t sell them to me.

Do you? Even the display rails, signs, shelves....?

The "display only" items are exactly the same. Part of the shop fittings, albeit seasonal ones.

This

Really? Everything? If you saw the assistant’s handbag behind the counter and liked it you would expect her to sell it to you? If you liked the curtain on the fitting room, or a picture on the wall in there, you would expect them to be for sale?

I expect the stuff that is clearly listed for sale, with price tags/stickers on, to be for sale. Nothing else.

There's a dog charity shop near me that has two big stuffed dogs in the window. I guess they get asked a lot as there's a sign saying they are not for sale. But I bet they still get asked (they are dressed up as service dogs and are life sized but are toys, not specific display props).
If it was my shop I'd use any random stuffed dog toy in the window and sell them! After all a shop window should display items for sale...

This wasn't the case here, that someone would need to climb into the window. It's a big glass pane (used to be an Estate Agents) with shelves across. I/they can just take it off the shelf. I understand your points about distraction and having a coordinated display though.

People will still go in and ask to buy them all the time. The only people who ever read/take notice of signs are the ones for whom they aren't necessary.

How many life-sized stuffed dogs do they have regularly donated, if they can just keep selling the ones in the window and replacing them like for like?

In fact, why don't they just keep all of the donated large stuffed dogs in the shop, on sale, and then say, when asked, "The dressed up ones in the window aren't for sale, but we have all of these very similar ones which are"?!

Imagine my incredulity at not being allowed to purchase the chair behind the cash desk at my local hospice shop! Outrageous!

🙄

They used to have a regular sketch on CBBC's Saturday Mash-up featuring an often-absent shopkeeper and his woefully incompetent nephew left to run their shop called 'We Sell Stuff'.

On one episode, they had a sale to shift some stock and put up signs saying 'EVERYTHING is £1'.

As well as people arguing the toss between whether it meant every item was £1 each or the entire lot was £1 in total, they had one girl who came along - making no bones about the fact she was a CF (not using that exact phrase!) - and insisted on buying the till, including all of its contents, for just a quid!