Giving up on charity shop shopping!

[Notcontent]

I have always bought a large proportion of my clothes second hand. When I was a teenager (not in the U.K.) it was largely due to financial reasons. This was before second hand became cool. Anyway, the habit stayed with me and over the years, living in London, my wardrobe has been a mix of second hand (80% I would say), basics from places like Uniqlo and the occasional more expensive new item.

But in the last couple of years or so I have increasingly found very little worth buying in my local charity shops. There are fewer nice things (being sold online maybe?) and what is there is really expensive. Today I had a good look and there were gems like a shrunken Uniqlo jumper for £17 and lots of similar things.

When i was volunteering on Thursday the manager said we had several bags of “cull” - excess stock from another store that they had tried to sell for a few weeks and had taken off sale to make room for new. We always double check the pricing rather than just putting it straight out.

omg the pricing was all over the place. Primark tops in poor condition for £6, a bnwt mint velvet top for £6 too. Lots and lots of cheap supermarket and H&M dresses priced at a tenner. And the very best (worst?) a Jaegar shirt, fairly decent condition, £29.99 😱

No wonder it hadn’t sold! So the cheapie dross went for rags and the rest got a realistic price - think I stuck £8 on the Jaegar shirt.

I used to be a massive charity shop buyer now it's mostly overpriced crap.
Vinted is amazing, but sad the money doesn't go to charity.

There’s a few charity shops near me - whilst it’s true they are not as good as they used to be for clothes , there’s still bargains to be had. I go in twice a week, I’ve had a few good pairs of jeans & recently an oversized denim jacket from Topshop. Kids clothes are not very good though, rarely find anything in good condition, it’s usually all faded and bobbled. Vinted is excellent for kids stuff, in fact pretty much all of my dcs clothes are from Vinted!

My mum used to volunteer at a local charity shop and said that loads of clothes were unsold and went for rag. I always think that's a shame as the clothes would've likely sold had they been priced more reasonably.

Even George, Primark, Shein etc will sell if it's priced accordingly.

I don't know why charity shops just don't stick up a large rail and whack all the Primark and supermarket stuff on there 99p per item. It will fly. And much better than selling for rag.

I live in one of the poorest counties in the UK but it’s still possible to find treasures in the local charity shops. Some of them are rubbish at pricing though & you can pay almost the same for George etc as it costs new plus the designer stuff is often priced at hardly any more than the high street stuff. What I really miss is the massive warehouse that used to be open at the back of one of the hospice shops - it was amazing! Four items of clothing for £1, sometimes with tags on. Beautiful coffee table books for £1. 3 items of jewellery or bric a brac for £1. Toys games & puzzles 3 for £1. I was in there A LOT!

They are rubbish in my town. Everyone uses Facebook buy and sell groups instead here.

I find the charity shops in my town really pricey. I picked up a sweet summer dress the other day for my little girl - £9! It was Joules. But I put it back. I think a child’s summer dress should be £2-4 max. They also do a lot of second hand bobbled Boden type stuff for £20. Not a bargain.

My mum used to volunteer at a local charity shop and said that loads of clothes were unsold and went for rag. I always think that's a shame as the clothes would've likely sold had they been priced more reasonably.

No. The stuff we rag is too poor quality for anyone to buy. Stained, torn, misshapen, buttons missing, faded. Would you buy a child's t-shirt with paint stains on the front? Or a 10 year old George at Asda dress which has been worn and worn to death, washed 100 times and is now faded and thin? Or something which was fashionable for a while and is no longer - like a cold shoulder top? There are some things which just won't sell, even if you price them for 5p each.

When we send things for "rag" they are recycled - anything we've missed and could potentially be sold is sold by the central warehouse, the rest is sorted by colour/fabric and shredded for things like mattress stuffing. And we get paid per kg for everything we sent to be ragged.

Thinking that charity shops should be able to sell everything they are given is completely unrealistic.

I volunteer in the eBay department for a charity and all their shops are supposed to send the designer and high/end High St brands to them to sell online. It’s worth checking the charities sites on eBay if you like the designer/high end brands.

I love a charity shop but find you need to visit very regularly in order to get quality items or a bargain. I’ve had some amazing things but also seen some absolute crap that belongs in the bin. Staff at the charity I volunteer with said that often the bizarre pricing discrepancies are from elderly or non-brand-aware shop volunteers who have little clue so stick any price on an item.

No. The stuff we rag is too poor quality for anyone to buy.

Same at the shop my mum volunteers at. I bag my items for rags separately and the charity shop likes rag bags as it's quick money without needing to store it.

Charity shops receive so much rubbish and broken stuff people can't be bothered to take to the tip. My mum's has a garage but it's full to bursting of seasonal stuff - while we might want to give away winter clothes in the spring, they have to store them until September.

It's not usually a case of boxes of beautiful designer clothes (even though we live in a wealthy area), it's bobbly Primark T-shirts, broken toys and jigsaws with missing pieces.

I find they are very hit and miss. Occasionally you can find a real bargain. But most of the time it’s primark/shein clothing marked as more than it cost brand new. Like anyone is going to pay that.
I don’t go in many anymore and avoid the big corps (oxfam etc) as they are the worst for overpricing. I’ll only shop in the local hospice shops now as they are the only ones that price reasonably

I volunteer in a charity shop and any really valuable items we receive are sold on ebay. We have usually hit the annual ebay target well before year end. Great news for the charity but not for the shoppers hoping for a bargain.

There are so many misconceptions about charity shop, (I manage one) I absolutely agree with a PP that many of the items we receive are completely unsaleable ... I often put out a box of items 'for free' against company policy just to try and get rid of them as we are a small shop and just can't keep the unsaleable stuff for the rag/bric a brac collections. Even then it rarely gets taken. Pricing is rarely an issue of why things don't sell.

So much depends on how the shop is run, I like to think I run a good charity shop, I have lots of regular customers, our pricing strategy is good - stuff sells - I am happy to 'barter' if perhaps something is overpriced or we have had it on display for more than a couple of weeks. I don't put out Primark or similar brands.

What I would love to understand is why people continue to donate items that are just not saleable ... I received a nice looking box of glasses the other day ... when I opened it every single one was chipped. Why would someone donate that rather than just recycling the glass themselves? Too often charity shops are seen as dumping grounds .. some customers get very huffy when I (politely) turn away unsuitable donations.

I only ever shop at charity shops, you soon get to know the good ones.

The COL crisis has definitely affected charity shops. Like you OP I’ve been a charity shopper all my life, I don’t need hints and tips. It’s just a fact that overall the shops have raised prices and less people are donating decent items. Also, more people are going to charity shops.

I volunteer at one, we have really good donations including designer (though we only yield at around 20% that is 80% is ragged or binned).

Prices are reasonable, most adult clothes are £5-10 with kids clothes under £5 unless new with tags/designer. We have price guides based on brands

We do though get quite a lot of unworn items complete with tags, these are priced higher eg I bought my dd (adult) a brand new Kath kidson dress with tags for £14.99 which she was most pleased with

I should add that we steam and hang out 2 lots a day weekdays and the new items which are good often sell within minutes, other things are taken off sale after 2 weeks and sent to a "bargain" store in our chain or a branch in a different location and priced lower.

Top tip, never go charity clothes shopping in city centres, they get the cast offs from the suburban stores! Affluent areas have better brands but for designer stock especially kids we find it donated in less expected areas.

Agree with @Ragwort that it'd be lovely to know what goes through some people's heads when they donate things we could never sell in a million years, and which is only fit for the bin.

I don't think cost of living has encouraged more people to go charity shopping, I don't really notice that we're busier than we were pre-pandemic and takings aren't up much either. What is different is the quality of clothing we are getting.

People are buying more cheap fast fashion like Primark, H&M, supermarket which generally does not last and even if we can sell it, we can only get a couple of quid for it. If people do have higher quality cast offs from more expensive brands, they are more aware that there is a market for these on apps like Ebay or Vinted and are more prepared to sell and make a few pounds than handing to us.

So it's getting rarer to open a bag and find it full of Hobbs, Cos, Reiss, Karen Millen. More common to open a bag of Florence and Fred, George at Asda, H&M, Papaya or Atmosphere and perhaps finding one item in the whole bag worth selling.

I have just done a wardrobe cull because I have retired early so got rid of work stuff that I no longer will wear - Hobbs, M&S, Ted Baker etc can't be arsed with selling so it's gone to charity. There must be others still donating. I used to love charity shops, don't find much these days but definitely don't look as often as I used to.
I do think it's probably partly me because I am extremely fussy about what I allow in my wardrobe now too many meh items, mistakes and hanging on to unworn stuff that I don't do anymore.
Last thing I bought was a H&M jacket new with tag on that I have worn loads.

Have you tried Sainsbury’s Tu, Matalan, TK Maxx, Tesco F&F, TJ Hughs? 🌹

I don't get many nice things in charity shops either so I do see what you mean.

I get the odd thing from Vinted, but no true bargains.

I really DO sell bargains imho on there as I usually just want rid! But they go quickly.

I also used to go to a charity shop really near my flat which was known for having amazing bargains as it was quite an affluent area, but there was never anything in my size (14/16). Then one day I noticed a well dressed woman the same size who worked there and I wondered if she was grabbing all the good stuff before it could go out 😂

I'm sure not, but I did wonder

I wondered if she was grabbing all the good stuff before it could go out

🙄There's always one who has this weird, perverse idea that all charity shop volunteers are stealing "the good stuff".

It's very wrong and insulting to those of us who give up our time, week in, week out, to go through people's bags, often filled with rubbish.

The volunteers in our shop are allowed to buy items, provided it's been priced by someone else.

My mum's in her 80s and has volunteered for 25 years so the odd find isn't too outrageous. Mind you, her idea of a find isn't exactly mine and the charity shop is happy to sell stock and make space for new things.

You get the odd good find, most of my blouses have come from charity shops, but equally there's a lot that is overpriced.

Bought something from one recently and when I went to pay for it the volunteer asked ' did I want to round up the price to help disabled people '

This annoyed me, it was guilt tripping . Surely by buying something I was already helping the charity?