Charity Begins on Television

Advantages: Cheap
Disadvantages: Not cheerful

...Watching Mary Portas wield the big stick over the pensioners in the Save The Children shop on Mary Queen of Shops on BBC2 as she tackled charity retail it was quite revealing to learn that only 25% of the stuff sent in was actually resalable. They basically had to throw away most of the donations and send a lot of the clothes to be used as rag to stuff pillows and stuff, and this in a posh area. False teeth and used nappies were even sent it. People basically don't send stuff in that they think might actually make the charity some money but stuff they deem crap but don't want to throw away because they feel guilty or something. I don't really think about that until she discovered that home fact. The truth is big companies are no different and use charities for dumping grounds, sending faulty or disconnected items in huge...

thedevilinme 08.08.2009 (11.08.2009) · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

Running for Charity

Advantages: Earn money for good causes
Disadvantages: Some people are not keen to help

...and even entered my first 10k race in the June. After completing this race I then looked for my next challenge and entered the Great Scottish Run, a half marathon to be run in September. At this point I decided that if I was going to run this race, I was going to run it for charity. I decided to run for the British Heart Foundation in memory of my Gran who we had lost a few months before. I contacted the charity and they were pleased to have me on board and supplied me with a running t-shirt with their name on it to wear during the race. I raised about £170 from this run, which wasn't as much as I would have liked although it was £170 that the charity would not have had if I hadn't ran for them. My next challenge as a lot of you will know from a previous review was a full marathon which took place at the start of June in Edinburgh...

killiefan 29.06.2006 · Read review
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Review of Running for Charity

Anyone for charity?

Advantages: Helping the poor/ needy.
Disadvantages: High prices.

...So what can one say about charity shops? It is not as if we don't already give enough to charity already, without having to spend even more money in one of their shops! OK, so that is a slight exagaration, but you know what I mean. Of course, charity shops are not all that bad because you do in effect help those who are less needy than yourselves. Examples of charity shops: There are course two different forms of charity shops, those which are local and those which are national. National: these include Oxfam; Cancer Research; PDSA, and the British Heart Foundation. Local (Plymouth): St Lukes Hospice (a local cancer respite centre); Dame Hannah Rogers (a shool for physically disabled children), also some local charity run care homes have a small shop close by to where they are actually based. Of course, local...

dynamicnurse 24.09.2007 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

It's for charity

Advantages: helps the needy
Disadvantages: ?

...Charity shops are excellent, a good way of recycling things reusing things that are of no use to their first owner anymore. They are an excellent way of raising money for charity. There are many different charities that have shops age concern, save the children, Oxfam to name a few. Volunteers staff charity shops and the general public gives the goods to them as donations. Charity shops often sell their own Christmas cards. Some charity shops are better than others cleaner and just generally nicer. The charity shops that stock the better clothing are usually in a good area where people can afford to buy designer clothes and throw them away the next season. Just recently I have taken to shopping in Charity shops there are two in the small town I live in and 3 in the town I work in. I have not been shopping for me but my...

mumsymary 08.08.2003 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

GO SHOPPING FOR CHARITY

Advantages: You can have a bigger wardrobe for less money
Disadvantages: You never know whether they'll have what you want

...Don?t you just hate those dingy, musty smelling shops full of moth-eaten clothes and plastic handbags where an unkempt woman rummages through the piles of fraying cast-offs in hopes of providing clothes for herself and 8 kids? So do I, but I can?t say I?ve seen one since I was a kid back in the 60?s being dragged inside our local Oxfam shop on a regular basis by my mother and grandmother. The modern charity shop, of which there are about 6,500, is an altogether different matter. The clothes are properly laundered, displayed systematically, and the clientele are just as likely to be well groomed, professional women who are sick of the rip-off prices of the fashion industry as mothers on a budget looking for a decent wardrobe. In common with the a large chunk of the population, I live on a tight budget. Designer labels are out...

CherryBlossom 07.06.2004 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

Help out your local charity shop today!

Advantages: Makes you feel nice to help them out, clears space at home, get some bargains!
Disadvantages: None really, occasionally the odd problem with a book but nothing major.

...Whilst I would rarely buy clothes from a charity shop I am always looking in here for bargains, some of which are just ridiculously cheap! I am a very enthusiastic book reader and on a good week I can get through 2-3 books. Thus, I need a place that can satisfy my need without being too expensive. I generally find that I can pick up a few good chick-lits and autobiographies for 99p-£1.50. This is a fantastic price for something that has generally only been read or two by another person. I have found on the odd occasion that there have been pages missing and on one occasion I got a face full of sand whilst reading a book upside down! But then the people in charity shops work hard to get everything out on the shelves and organised they can't be held responsible for checking that a 600 page book has every single page otherwise they...

katyeverett 22.05.2009 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

Charity muggers

Advantages: Good constant source of income for charities
Disadvantages: Irritating

...I work in the heart of London and every day I am accosted by volunteers in bright bibs carrying clipboards. Today it was Save the Children, tomorrow it will be another charity. Usually teams of 3-6 fundraisers space themselves out along the street, creating an obstacle course that is impossible to avoid. So ubiquitous are these people that they are becoming known as ?chuggers? or ?charity muggers?. Their standard routine is to try to grab your attention, usually by asking if you have a minute. Then they tell you their name and about the problems that the charity is trying to deal with. The next step is how the charity plans on solving these problems and why x amount of money would help. That is when they ask you to sign up to a regular contribution via direct debit. For me, they create a strange mixture of emotions...

Maia 18.04.2003 · Read review
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Review of Should charity begin at home?

This Charity is not for me.

Advantages: Undoubtedly a worthwhile cause.
Disadvantages: Costs taken from donations/ money earned?

...Rather a subject which could provoke many feelings and I for one do believe in charity shops, mainly by donating items no longer of either use or ornament as the saying goes, clothes, bric a back , games and the list goes on. I usually share my donations of whatever to causes I have faith in and believe do the utmost for their cause. Now to get to the real point of my review which is the one charity shop I boycott in a sense totally out of a personal experience I had with a colleague a few years ago during a fraud enquiry. During this enquiry we discovered that for every £1.00P Oxfam made, 90 pence went in costs and only 10 pence actually went to the cause, which we both found illuminating and certainly shocking. Now whether this has changed since or not I do not know but it left a lasting impression on both myself and my...

plod591 24.09.2007 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

Charity Starts at Home....

Advantages: Lots of Bargains to be had
Disadvantages: none

...I have been a regular customer in charity shops for many years now and my dear departed mum used to absolutely adore checking out her local charity shops for whatever bargains they might have. There are a number of national charities that have a chain of shops and in some areas you will also find local charities have a few shops in their area. I am going to concentrate this review on my local British Red Cross Charity shop where I have been a volunteer for over a year and may soon become a paid employee. In our shop we have two paid personnel and the rest of the work force is made up entirely of volunteers. Volunteers are encouraged by the opportunity to get out and meet people and do something worthwhile with their time and for anyone who does four or more hours volunteering, their bus fare will be reimbursed. Added to this...

Lindylou13 09.07.2005 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)

Charity Shops Are Good For You

Advantages: Cheap clothes. Bargain books and magazines
Disadvantages: sometimes a bit cluttered

...The very first charity shop opened just after World War II in Oxford and today they are very much a feature on Britain's high streets. In most sizeable towns there are a wide and diverse assortment of shops ranging from Oxfam, Dr Barnadoes, British Heart Foundation,Help the Aged, Imperial Cancer Research Fund, The Sue Ryder Foundation, Save the Chidren Fund,War on Want,The Spastics Society to Age Concern. The latter is one of the charity shops I patronise the most and there are plenty of outlets throughout England and Wales. I believe there is a separate organisation in Scotland and Northern Ireland. First a bit of background about Age Concern. This charity was established in order to make life better for elderly people,mainly by providing services through an extensive network of more than 1,000 local groups manned by around...

ashford 22.03.2002 · Read review
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Review of Charity shops (Shop)