General Chat

I'm unrepentant! I realise that this is a "dirty" job for volunteers - yes, that's volunteers, not the Regional Managers etc. I have to believe that the people who give such disgusting items to charity, are, in fact, Landlords, clearing out abandoned properties, and see the charity shop doorway as being nearer, and cheaper, than a trip to the tip. And, blimey, wish I could earn 35K a year, let alone 150K.I humbly suggest, that if only £10K profit is produced by a charity shop with a turnover of £50K, might it not be better to close the shop down and go out with the collecting tins instead? At least that would be pure profit. But, no, I dont think so. Charity shops ARE businesses, and as with all other businesses, someone is out to make a profit and cynically ride along with the perks that go with the job. I think the reason that people are not so keen to give to charity anymore is that most people are becoming wise to the fact that their money is not being used in the way they expected it to be - i.e. for the object of the charity. You only have to see the response of the general public to a national, or international disaster, to know that people arent mean. I am not trying to put down all you stalwart volunteers, indeed managers, of charity shops, none of this is your fault and I admire the spirit which prompts you to do this work - it sure aint the money at YOUR level - you are being as cynically exploited as we, the general public, are.

Hi everyone, only just 'connected' so only just seen this thread so would like to put in my twopennyworth! Working for the same Charity as Janet I can vouch for everything she says and have myself sorted the same sort of sacks, found similar items along with a 'dead rat' a sack full of mice (also dead, luckily!) and only a couple a weeks ago a razor sharp Knife half out of it's sheath if I hadn't by luck got hold of the sheath there would have been a couple of fingers added to the stock! Some of you are interested in how much the charities actually pass to those they are supporting, in our case it is approx 88p out of every pound that leaves just 12p for all the running costs, advertising, wages, rates etc. etc. etc. All reg. charities publish a annual review. As for Christmas cards if you buy them, it tells you on the back how much of the pack price goes to the charity sometimes it is as little as 5p, our charity produce our own cards that we sell and they say quite clearly that 100% goes to the charity. Often when we turn down offered donations it is for a variety of reasons. We have to comply to different regulations,(if not, can be fined heavily or shut down) ie. Health & Safety, Fire. Trading Standards & Local safety Rules. So space is one reason, but we are not allowed to sell electricals, inflatables, cycle/crash helmets, toys without CE marks, nursery equipment over a certain age etc. the list goes on. Of course we still get all these type of items usually amongst the 30 odd sacks left in the doorway on a Monday morning that have been rifled through, that we then have to move or climb over to unlock the front door to enable us to fall inside. These items then have to moved by the Dustmen who charge me £1;50 a sack to do it! hardly cost effective. Rags are not so bad as they can be re-cycled and we get the grand amount of £1 per sack as long it weighs 8kilos. After all this I still love my job and the knowledge I'm supporting people who need it, my volunteers are a brilliant crowd. Anyone who has never seen behind the scenes in a charity shop ought to try it for a month to really understand. Why not offer your services for ' Make a Difference Day' at the end of the month? Lynn.

Hi Marjorie, They do employ mangers in their shops.I know of a woman earning a hell of alot of money from her job in the charity shop than I was in my job in a hospital pharmacy.I am not belittling her job but I thought charity meant charity and to work for the good not for financial gain.

totally agree i love going round charity shops at one time it was called a poor mans shop but now the price they charge for some of the things is as dear as new shops.we have 3 thats just been refitted why havnt a clue they didnt need it . think its about time something was done though they could of done a lot with the money it must of cost them to refit tina xx

we have many charity shops in our small town i never thought bout how much of the money actually goes to the charity before i do buy books from them but not much else

oh janet, i wish everyone in the uk [ well yorkshire anyway] would read your message, take heed and think before they donate, some bag contents are scary ! i manage a hospice shop and some days i could scream. but the money the shop raises goes straight to the hospice, and that keeps me sane. and we dont all spend lots on re fits, but the shop has to look welcoming and clean, the days of second hand shops is long gone. we do not have many shops, so perhaps things are a little different for me than they are for the managers of the larger charities.a very high percentage of my turnover goes straight to the hospice,and each year we see the improvements at the hospice ,childrens areas, extra beds, equipment etc. i wouldnt swap my job for anything, and my volunteers are wonderful- more like friends than work mates. i love it, sue.

I hope were all grown ups here. In ten+ years of charity work I have found a c*ck ring, a p*nis enlarger, sh*tty nappies, condoms, tampons and skidmarked underwear. Just remember this when you next donate a bag of "treasures" look at each article and think, "would I buy this in this condition?" If the answer is no, don't donate it. We do not have facilities to wash, dry clean clothes(In all honestly would it be cost effective to wash dry and iron 60+black bags of clothes a week?)and if your donations are turned down , this is because everyone in England has decided to donate stuff on that day. Short of having walls of elastic and large bribes for the health and safety executive, we are full to bursting point, not holding a grudge against you personally. It only takes a short phone call to ensure your local shop can receive your goods. Please also remember most a lot of charities can not take electrical equipment (I told this to the man who walked half a mile to my shop carrying a 20 inch T.V. Wouldn't you have called first? Of course, it was all my fault as everything usually is.)

Working for a charity as a shop manager I have to say that the public expect the shop to be enticing. We are not just there to raise the funds, but also to raise the profile of the charity. The shop on the High Street is what keeps the charity in the public's mind. It is far more cost effective to refit a shop and give the customers a positive experience than to spend millions on T.V. advertising. Charity shops, contrary to popular belief, Do pay Business rates but at a slightly reduced amount. Permanent Shops also Do pay full rent, electric, gas etc. Some charities do take on un-rentable premises on a short term basis rent free. Landlords aren't, in general known for their altruism so I guess they do this to stop vandalism of the property. However, the second they find a tenant for the property the charity concerned has 24 hours to vacate the premises. My turnover last year was close on 50k on that the actual net take after overheads was 10k of which 100% went to the charity. A friend of mine worked for a local charity in a rent free shop, you know the type, where everything is 50p sort of thing. Yes, you do sell more but at the end of the week she was lucky to have two hundred pounds in her till. The charity struggled a bit then gave up because it was unsustainable even though part of the charities work was to help people with mental health problems train to find their place in society and to give them confidence. Lets just hope that no one in the area has a breakdown and needs support to find thier way on the road to recovery. I used to work for Oxfam and I can remember the tut tutting when people heard that the Director was on 36 k a year. Of course they never even considered that he could have walked out of that job at any time and walked into the public sector where he could have earnt 150k+ Oh, and don't forget, while the shop may look all sparkling new the back area where the staff and volunteers work has probably not seen a lick of paint since Moses was a lad. Trust me, I know what its like to slave away for 45+ hours a week in a storeroom/sorting room/ rest room measuring approx 10 ft by 10ft for 7 years and I certainly don't do it 'cos the pays great either!

Oh dear! There goes my last charity donation! Thats the Sally Army out of it now, as well! I have been in the habit of handing out a sandwich and a hot drink to any young homeless person I happen to see, if Im getting my own lunch. Think I'll have to step that up a bit. And oddly, our local Hospice Shop is also a bit tatty, dead cheap though, perhaps Ill go there in future, they obviously dont waste any money on frills and dont appear to sell any new goods either.

Baz, absolutely right, they certainly do. Mandy x

That's what I do Baz - I donate directly to our local hospice. I do find though that the 'individual' charity shops are nowhere near as affluent as the large 'chains'. Our hospice's shop is clean and tidy, but not fitted out at vast expense. They also never turn down any donations. They produce their own Christmas cards and I buy those direct too - they get far more than the 10p per pack from some places! Oh yes, and harping back to my 'favourite' subject, retired Sally Army ministers can choose wherever they want to retire to - they select the place, then can go out and choose a property up to a certain amount (and it's more than enough to buy a 3-bed detached with ensuite). The SA then purchases the property, and the retireds rent it off them. It is fully maintained and decorated for them every few years - no having to chase up tardy landlords!

My Busines Rates and Rent trebled overnight, due to the advent of a "National Store" (who already had perfectly adequate premises in the town). The City Fathers seemed to lose their brains at the sight of the cheque-book being wagged in their faces and readily agreed to demolish TWO carparks and a bus station to accommodate the needs of the "National Store". I, and the surrounding small businesses then suffered a year of building works on our doorstep and the loss of the "walk-through" public to the bus station. It was then pronounced that we were now trading in the "Golden Mile". What a joke. We are now stranded on a pedestrianised Island, facing that National Store, which stands in isolated splendour, other businesses having failed miserably to follow it to the Golden Mile. However, as the National Store happily (or otherwise) stumps up over a million pounds in business rates every year, no one really cares. I was lucky - I only had a short lease and was able to get out, others, locked into long leases, have to watch their businesses rot. Our last remaining independant Department Store also closed its doors after 150 years of trading, finally felled by the new laws requiring them to have disabled facilities - totally impossible, the building was on many different levels and being Grade One listed - as I say, totally impossible no matter how much money had been thrown at the problem. I wrote to my MP to suggest that there be TWO levels of Business Rates - one for locals, one for National Chains. He wrote back to say he thought this was a "very interesting idea". Im not holding my breath.

I think Business Rates have crippled a lot of businesses. I often think of villages in days gone by,they had many thriving shops, now the villages have got more people living in them and the shops are all closing. Mum used to work for Oxfam as a volunteer, but gave up when she found out how much money 'the big wigs' were getting from the fruits of her (& others like her) efforts.

Helen - indeed, Charity Shops are there to raise money for charity - that is exactly my point, how many people would so happily pay the over-inflated prices for clothes if they knew the money was going towards an expensive shop refit rather than to the object of the charity? I really feel it is time the Charity Commissioners looked again at what constitutes a charity - running a shop as a business does not, in my mind, constitute a charity. What percentage of their turnover actually goes to the cause it was intended for? In my last full year of business I had a turnover of nearly £100,000. By the time I had paid rent, business rates, insurance and other overheads, I came out with less than three thousand pounds for a year's very hard work. If Charity shops wish to act like businesses then that's fine, as long as they have to obey the same rules as me, and as long as the poor unsuspecting customers understand that perhaps less than 9% of what they hand over will actually get to the needy.

Charity shops are there to raise money for charity. They are not there to provide a "charity" shop for buyers. It is big business these days. Personally I would rather go into a well-fitted out charity shop with clean good quality goods than a tatty place that needed a lick of paint. I am quite sure that these places would have painters/decorators for free if they could - but they can't. That's why they pay. You only have to see how many more charity shops there are now than there were say 10 years ago to see how big business it's become. I used to work for a charity, and believe me the Shops Department was run like a business. The man in charge had formerly worked for M & S. He never opened a new shop - and we did get offered cheap lets often by property owners - unless he'd had a count of how many people (ie potential buyers) walked past in an hour. If there weren't enough it was no go. nell

Marjorie - believe me the Sally Army are just as bad as the rest. Do you know their 'officers' (ministers) have company cars? They also get the pick of anything decent that comes into their charity shops. They employ PR agencies for their annual appeal. I could go on a roll here but it would be at the expense of causing my husband some embarassment as his parents are retired officers, and he's a very loyal and supportive husband to me so it wouldn't be fair. The only thing they don't do (as far as I know) is let the collectors of envelopes have a percentage for counting the money - I know that some charities offer this little perk. But believe me - you'd be surprised! I had better get off my soapbox now lol. Mandy :)

Glad Im not alone in this. I cant help thinking that if I had not had to pay business rates, got volunteer staff and didnt have to pay anything for my stock - I could have done rather well! And another thing - why does a perfectly ordinary, black polyester "work skirt" (ex C and A's) warrant a price tag of £5? Perhaps if these charity shops reduced their prices on stuff which frankly, used to go to jumble sales, they might sell more. And no, I shall never give to charity again - the only one I ever give to now, is the Sally Army - at least they get on and "do it," and as far as I know, dont cream off the top to keep up their "business image".

Is it just me? I noticed last week with horrified disbelief that my local charity shop was closed "for shop refit". This turned out to be, not a few volunteers with some odd pots of paint etc, but a professional firm of shopfitters, doing the place out from floor to ceiling. When I asked where the money was coming from for this, I was told, very politely, to mind my own business. As an ex-shopkeeper, who finally threw in the towel in the face of impossibly high overheads, including of course, business rates, I am getting very cross at the unfair advantage Charity Shops have over other businesses. While I do not for one moment have any quarrel with the aims of raising money for charity, I DO have a beef about this money, given in good faith by the public, being spent on something which is neither necessary, nor charity! I have also heard this week, of the manager of another charity shop giving up her (paid) job, because she was told that the charity she works for is not a charity, but a business. Ok, if its a business, then it can pay busines rates, tax, full rent etc like other businesses do. Am I just a miserable old crow?