BHF refuse my donation of an antique Edwardian Windsor chair

There is a thread on MN saying that people should clean items before putting them on Freecycle and similar, and there are some similarities with this one, I think. Some on the MN thread are saying that if they are giving stuff away it is often as part of a clearout. They just want rid of it and would prefer to let someone have it if they can use it than for it to go to landfill, but expect any work to be done by the taker, not the giver. Others seem to think they are doing people a favour by taking things from them and expect the donor to scrub things up before offering them.

I can see both sides - someone else's grot is different from one's own, but at the same time if someone is mid-clearout they might be tempted just to send something to landfill than have to clean it up and then risk rejection from a shop, or a no-show from a Freecycle collector.

I think there is a clash of attitudes where charity shops/Freecycle are involved, and neither is wrong. Charity shops of the Jumble Sale/Aladdin's Cave type used to have all kinds of random items. People could try to match a tea set that had a broken saucer, and if it was a popular style there was a chance that Oxfam (or somewhere) might have the saucer they wanted for pennies. Now they only sell full sets of expensive brands and charge £££ for them. Similarly, there might be a dress with a button missing, but buyers could easily sew on a button and get a good quality item they might not have been able to afford new for a small charge and the cost of a button. Now even expensive items that are not 100% perfect are binned. When women were at home all day they may have had time to sew on buttons catch hems and iron clothes before donating them, but these days many are too busy to do that even with their own clothes.

It used to be a simple deal - charity shops had items that had no intrinsic value (unless you were lucky) but could be worth a lot to someone who happened to be looking for a particular thing, or who could put in the time scrubbing or repairing them. The donators got rid of things they didn't want, and felt good about supporting causes they believed in.

Now expectations have changed. People have less time, things like clothes can often be bought cheaply when new, not as many people can mend. Also, fast fashion means that there is a quicker turnover of items as people dispose of more things than they used to.

Meanwhile, many charity shops see themselves as boutiques and only want perfect items in pristine condition, and won't accept anything less. Regulations based on health and safety mean that there are restrictions on what they are legally allowed to take. Obviously shops have limited floorspace, and can't house everything that people give, but at the same time, they rely on good will from donors, which they will destroy by rudeness and making people feel rejected. Also, people often drop things off on the way to somewhere, and if they are rejected will have to take them along. A combination of those things is likely to put people off donating.

Maybe if the model changed, and people offered things for sale to charity shops instead of giving them away it would feel less offensive if they were rejected?

So what happens to all the perfectly useable goods that charity shops are too snooty to sell? Are they tipped to go to land fill or what.

Perhaps we need a second layer of charity shops, the Poundlands and B&M's of the charity world, to sell the cast-offs of the designer Charity boutiques.

Thank goodness my 17 year old GD is a skilled needlewoman and can buy, adapt and repair chairty shop buys.

Why don't you sell the chair and donate what you get for it.

I don't think charity shops have changed. I volunteered in one 30 years ago and substantial amounts of stuff was binned. Clothes had a shop life of so long, then were reduced, if they still failed to sell they were bagged and sold as rags. The shop I worked in usually refused furniture because it had no space.

It's funny that people will often pay to have a relative's house emptied after a death, and think there is little of value there, but think their own cast offs are priceless.

We downsized a few years ago and sold almost everything on Marketplace. Didn’t make a fortune but were happy with what we got and that everything found a new home. We could have sold our beds several times over. We also put items on free cycle too. Charity shops received our smaller stuff including books and clothing. I think it’s a case of knowing who wants what.

When I moved in to a new house I brought with me a restored mahogany chest of drawers and a bureau, complete with beautiful brass handles and fitted compartments inside. They had belonged to my parents.

They looked completely wrong in my new house, the sheer size of them dominated the rooms they were in.

Eventually, I decided to sell them. No one in my family wanted them. In the end I gave the bureau to a Cancer Charity Shop. The chest of drawers went to a store called Refurnish - supposedly selling stuff cheaply to people on low incomes. I realised later that most of the furniture was sold to dealers who took the antique pieces to upmarket stores elsewhere to sell at much higher prices.

One day appreciation of antiques will come back - or will it?

Well maybe when they start building larger houses with bigger rooms. Some rooms in new builds are so small that opening the door to them takes half the room up.

There is plenty of small pieces of older furniture around that looks perfect in houses with smaller rooms. I have just spent a weekend with my Ds and DBiL who have a small house and every room had small pieces of furniture, a pew, dining table and seperate chairs - not a set, ocasional tables, book cases etc etc.

It's just a question of taste, isn't it? Not everyone likes old things, whilst others will pay a premium for them.

We had a small charity shop next to our work. We used it as a hardware store - light bulbs, plug, mugs etc.

We had to buy a lockable wheelie bin as donators would come out with their rejects and drop them in our bin.

It closed after the volunteer manager got fed up with the district manager arriving in her expensive company car and complaining she wasn’t making enough money and was rude to her. No taking into account the large number of donations received which were collected regularly to take to the warehouse - never seen a charity advertise their warehouse before on a tourist Facebook page.

I think accountants run these businesses making no allowance for the local community

MOnica
I can’t wait till tomorrow to tell the girls the new name for our charity. Poundland & B&Ms. That sums up our shop in a nutshell 😂
I was trying to think of the strangest donation. I think is the Pneumatic jackhammer drill. Fortunately I have 2 neighbours who are builders.

TizLiz
A lot of managers in the big charities are hassled all day from central office.

A few years ago I had a red fabric three piece suite to donate to BHF. It was in very good condition but when the guys arrived they pointed out that one chair had lost its fire retardant label. Obviously it did have one but I threw it away when it ripped off. They would not take that chair even though it was identical to the other pieces. I ended up taking it to the recycling centre where it was put into a container. I like to think the container was the ‘rest’ place for the workers otherwise, what a waste!

After my mother died I thought BHF might like some of the furniture from her house. The person who came marched round the house rejecting most items but took one wall unit remarking that it would only fetch £35. He wouldn’t take the dining chairs as he couldn’t see the fire certificate but later I found it stuck under the seat. Whilst he was there he took a call on his mobile and said to the person on the other end he was nearly finished as everything was rubbish which was nice to hear when you’ve just lost your mother.

When I moved house I had lots of stuff to donate to BHF. They wouldn't take some book shelfs because I had painted them which I understood. I also had a very sturdy garden table but no chairs and they refused this as they said it had to be a set. I am pretty sure that someone could have bought some chairs to go with it and this made no sense at all. They made it very difficult, it makes you wonder if they really want our stuff?

When DD and SiL were moving into their second home, he took some bags of clothes to one of our local hospice charity shops. It was all good stuff; a lot of SiL’s John Lewis, M&S, Lands End, Hobbs, Karen Millen, Joules….. SiL was unshaven and in a state of some scruff, as he had been working hard packing boxes. The assistant looked him up and down and without even looking what was in the bags, said “we aren’t taking donations today.” He said “It’s all good stuff!” She said “I’m sorry.” It was their loss and he took them elsewhere where they were delighted to have them. The particular hospice was dear to all our hearts and it was very disappointing.
Regarding BHF, some years ago, my son and four of his friends ran the length of the Pembrokeshire coast path to raise money for two charities. One was the hospice that his wife spent her last days in, and the other was BHF in memory of the mother of one of his friends. That, and a charity auction that was held at his RAF station, raised several thousand pounds. The hospice accepted their half and were very pleased to allow the RAF to get some publicity photos for the RAF News. It took eleven weeks and several emails to get BHF to respond and send someone to accept their cheque. They were not exactly fulsome in their gratitude, and no publicity. Horses for courses I suppose.

No one gets paid in our shop. We are lucky in that the organisation we help to support leaves it to the 3 of us.
We like that way.
But we do know how every penny we raise is spent.

They've probably run out of storage space.

When my brother died, i tried to donate a mattress which had been used once ( if that) there was a tiny mark (the size of a 5p piece) on the underside of the mattress. Easily removed. Refused by the charity but then so was the base and matching furniture.
My cousin tried to donate a piece of antique furniture which again was refused - sold to an American via ebay for thousands of pounds
It is how the refusal is provided that is the problem as many charity shop workers are rude. Hence when my brother died one charity had nothing and another had lots. The latter was polite and friendly. The former totally rude .

There are a couple of BHF furniture shops around me, and they also sell on Ebay, so shouldn't have been any problem.

I took 19 bags of clothing, etc (many items still had shop tags on them) into our local Scope shop last week. I did ask whether they had space to take them all because I would happily take some to Age UK nextdoor if they couldn't accommodate it all.
They started off a little unsure as to whether they had space for it all, but as soon as they saw the quality of the items in the first bag, they couldn't take the rest quickly enough.
They did also say to me that if there was anything they couldn't sell, they have other shops (and other charities) that they pass items on to, rather than binning things.
I used to share my donations around a variety of charities, but after hearing about this proactive sharing attitude, I'll be sending everything to Scope from now on.

It is difficult for charities to sell 'old furniture', antique or otherwise. It is not wanted these days.
If items are not sold they have to be taken to the tip and the charity has to pay for the disposal.
A lot of people just try to dump stuff on charities.
I know - I have worked for several over the years.

Most well known charities circulate their stock. It gets bagged and collected then taken to other branches. Apparently stuff that doesn’t sell in one shop might do well in another. They drop of stuff from the “other” shop at the same time
Seems a bit of a faff to me. Why not just keep reducing the price until it sells. Then send them off.
The problem might be that some have a minimum price policy they have to adhere to. Head office and all that🫤

I donated several older items of furniture to a charitable organisation which then teaches recovering addicts new skills to help them find employment. They sell the renovated items at in my view a high price, so make more money to support homeless recovering addicts.
I was pleased to get rid of otherwise unsaleable items and support a good cause.
One upholstered chair went to BHF. It had a fire label.

DEBRA is the charity that takes most in the way of furniture in our area. Would you be willing to try them?