When did charities start getting so picky?

That's wild!

I had no idea they were so selective these days. I wonder if Goodwill and Volunteers of America have gone snooty too.

Around here there's Housing Works, a charity which combines to help against Aids and homelessness. They don't tend to be very picky as long as an item is not completely demolished (or close to it). They take partial sets 3 out of 4 beverage glasses, 1 or 2 chairs, etc. etc. With shoes there is usually a desire for a proper pair of 2. They then sell things at reasonable prices, a so called thrift shop 2 blocks from the nearby location of HW, charges as if items were brand new...and has an attitude on them when a bag of clothes (clean and in good shape) gets dropped off.

I tried to donate a 14yo car that was running well and in very good condition to a church that was accepting cars. When I told them that the seats smelled like dogs, they never called back on it.

Well it just turned me off and as I result I plan on donating my goods elsewhere.

I offered to donate what I considered high quality furniture with yes some discoloration but one in which I had no issue having in my home so it wasn't bad. I called and they set up a delivery a couple of weeks later with a time any where between 8am and 4pm - I am giving you stuff and you can't narrow it done - I said I need to pick up my child during that time I won't be long but she is injured so she can't take the bus so I am be gone for a little while - they said they would call a half hour before they arrive.

No call - good thing I was in - and then right away he starts inspecting the table like I was the one in need of him taking it - then he said he couldn't take it -- it had to be perfect. He did apologize saying they are supposed to tell you that - and that they had wasted my time.

I didn't even offer up some of the other stuff I had that was also of high quality with probably even less marks. I was so turned off. They offered to take the chairs but I said no - if I am giving the table away I would want to be able to offer the chairs with it.

The thing is - don't they also give stuff to needy people - not just sell it in their stores? I mean wouldn't someone want a gift of a table and chairs with a discoloration rather than spend $50 or whatever they might sell it for?

They have to be able to sell stuff. They aren't just a junk hauler/storage facility. To you, it was fine furniture, to them it's something that is going to take up a lot of room in their store, be bulky to store and be difficult to sell. Would you pick your table if the one next to it was not discolored?

They are a charity, yes, but they still have a business to run.

I have direct experience of this. For 5 years in the 1990s I worked for a charity that collected donations of furniture, domestic goods, appliances etc, in Bristol, England. I started off as a volunteer, and ended up as manager. We put flyers around the city, and had 4 trucks, each with a crew of 2, who went around picking up donations. We had 10 phone lines and a crew of volunteers to take the calls. Trip sheets were made up each night for the truck crews. We had a guy who worked miracles with busted or old stoves, washing machines, fridges, and TVs. He could make 1 good washing machine out of 2 or 3 broken ones.

We gave away, or sold at low prices, the items collected, to people on welfare only. They might have been homeless, but now given an empty apartment that needed furnishing. or maybe they had had a fire, or just needed a new bed of table or whatever. We had a huge warehouse where we put the items collected, laid out like in a furniture store. People would turn up, show their welfare card, say "I need a bed", or a sofa, or table and chairs, or set of crockery, or whatever. We'd say "Sure, come in the warehouse and see if there is anything you want". We soon learned from experience that people would not choose mattresses with piss stains, or tables with cigarette burns, especially not cheap wood tables with cracked boards or stains, or stained armchairs . They had little money, but they had their dignity and they did not want junk. How could we force them to take it anyway? We could not let the warehouse gradually fill up with unwanted stuff.

We told the drivers not to bring back junk. I used to get phone calls from angry would-be donors saying that the driver had looked their very good bed over and rejected it. Were the poor getting fussy these days? The bed only had one loose leg, after all, and that mark on the mattress, well, it wasn't very big! We were well aware that the city government charged a fee to haul away large unwanted items. We also had the wonderful people who gave us stuff that they could easily have sold, but who preferred to give the benefit to people who were down on their luck.

So I am 100% behind the Salvation Army people.

McGentrix, we never took dismantled pressed wood items. Ikea type stuff. Flat-pack. It is designed to be put together ONCE. Take it apart and it is usually ruined. You can't put it back together again.

Yup. Doing his job right.


Yeah we met really charitable types just like this.

Yup. Same for furniture or rugs. Doggy smell. Yuk. No takers.

I used to hear this about 10 times a week.

Why would you disclose that? The church should have accepted it and broke the car down for its individual parts (and garnered whatever funds from the sale of the parts).

We would happily consider flat-pack items that were properly assembled (they aren't always) and in good condition. One thing which we never, ever took was sideboards. Do you have them in America? Nobody ever wanted them.



One thing we kept getting requests for was 'black ash wall units". Very popular around 1995. If we had anu donated they didn't hang around.

The sideboard looks a bit like an item I've seen in offices known as a credenza.

Yes. I Googled credenza cabinets. Looks like the same idea. Sideboard, buffet, server, credenza, cabinet and console. My parents in the 1950s and 60s had one which had drawers as well as doors, the door part had plates and cups, the drawers had cutlery, and on top was a vase of flowers and bottles of booze. I quite like them but nobody seems to want them in their homes any more.

A few years ago I called up about a bed - rather new and in tip top shape.
The social worker came and to a look at the bed and said no, people only want
things new. People = as homeless with first home, refugees and others in that category.
The social worker looked at the bed, told me his daughter had moved out and taken his good bed and left her not so good. He looked at me and I said
"Your are welcome to my bed"
So the social worked ended up with a used bed and somebody else got a new one.

I got a lot of stuff at the Salvation Army place in Santa Monica, California. They had quite the facility - essentially 3 different stores and (I don't quite remember) probably a nearby workshop and distribution area. The first moderately large room had excellent wares of many sorts (clothes, kitchen ware, ceramics..). Most of my coats are from that section. Then there was a larger room with what I'd call medium caliber items, a lot of this and that, not junk, fun to go through, nothing torn or dented. There was also a third room, where the word junk would come to mind. That was smaller and I didn't bother with it. Maybe that was a gathering of stuff to send elsewhere in the area.

Being in a nice area of the Los Angeles region, some of that store's donations could be real deals. I kind of miss that place - wonder if they are still there. That would have been in the 80's through the 90's.

Edit to add: Diane and I are going to the local GoodWill on Friday. We drop off donations, and then check out the shop. I need some new shorts for summer and maybe a skirt..

I just remembered - that's where I got my wonderful irish coat - Henry White, Dublin. I don't remember, guessing $2o, maybe 25. I just liked it.

On the other hand, I got a likely 40's trench coat at a tacky place in Venice (ca).
Venice was tacky when I lived there, later now booming with IT. I'd like to be a fly on the wall at the community meetings, if they still have them. I lived there from later '73 to late '98.

As I said, I've plenty of good coats bought for low money. I exaggerate, just part of a small closset.
Consignment stores are not interested in outfits with big shoulders.
I think they are missing a bet. Meantime, I can be warm in winter.

I understand that - but they also give donated goods to people who cannot afford to even buy in their stores. I would expect that someone unable to buy furniture even in one of their stores, would be very happy with a table that has a small discoloration. We were not giving it away because of this (we used it for years with it) - we gave it away because it did not fit our new home.

Also we have a local dump where we can deposit this furniture - we just took over a large rug that got ruined due to water damage - at no extra cost to us. We have so many times we can bring larger items. So it isn't the cost - it is I'd rather give it someone to use than to add to our landfill with something that is useable.