The Next Step. A Thrift Store!

[Bruce]

In the plaza where my pawn / gun shop is (I sold it in 2011) there is also a small thrift shop which takes donated clothes and household items and sells them to support a charity for homeless animals. If you choose to believe that.......

The woman running the place is tired of it so I bought it and am re doing the place to make it cleaner and accept more donated items. I take over Feb 1st.

His Jollyness is doing an updated web site for the place (donating his time and many talents to the charity, thank you) and the signs will be changed.

A sad reality here in the US is that people willingly help animals but not so much for humans. So I am developing a charity run program to help some homeless and sick animals in Catbalogan and at the same time generate funds for the charity to grow a bit and help the widows and single moms in Catbalogan as usual.

While the charity offers a tax deduction receipt, very few are interested in that aspect. Most use the thrift stores simply as a dumping ground to get rid of the things they do not want. In and out, here is some crap, er, ah I mean her are some ItemsI want to donate....

The current owner, who I have know for about 4 years refuses more than she takes. She just wants the very clean and top end items. I am changing all that to accept EVERYTHING as I have a dumpster in the back and a homless man named LeRoy who works for food and some things to sell on his own. LeRoy is willing to do the manual labor and I have a storage area for furniture. I also have 2 widows local here they will be happy to work for something to do and some pocket money.

The pic below is the store front and was taken by the sign company for their proposed changes. There are typos that I know about. It is simply their 1st draft.

store front.pdf

[ibemarshall]

Good Day Bruce,

What an exciting step you have taken. Your actions speak volumes for your commitment and have given me inspiration to follow along with you, albeit at a distance.

The Philippine Basic Needs Outreach Program is located in my wife's home province giving me a more personal relationship to the charity's success and future.

Onward & Upward...My strongest Best Wishes to you!

~marshall

P.S. - I will be contacting you regarding a couple of ideas I had to raise funding.

Note To JollyGoodFellow - I like what you did to the place ~~ aka charity website

[Bruce]

Well, if you want to send balikbyan boxe(s) to the wife's family, and include donations for the local poor, you can use the charity name and take a tax deduction for the donations and shipping costs. Assuming you rich California guys itemize your taxes, that is.

Where is the wife from on Samar?

[JJReyes]

Goodwill and the Salvation Army accepts all clothing donations. Their employees or trainees sort through the boxes for the best items to sell at their thrift stores. The remainder is packed into a 20 or 40 foot container. Entrepeneurs from the Philippines, Mexico, Pakistan, etc. buy the containers for shipping to their "ukat-ukat" ("search-seach") stores overseas.

While I don't think your thrift store is sufficiently large to generate large volume donations to fill a container, some entrepreneurs may approach your thrift shop with offers to buy boxes of donated clothes. It might be easier to receive the cash for purchase in the Philippines of food and medicines than trying to ship Balikbayan boxes. As mentioned in one of your earlier post, there are a lot of clothes available for the poor, but more are welcome. Unfortunately, the shipping costs for Balikbayan boxes may not be economical for clothes. The exception is using clothes as padding for other items of greater value.

[Old55]

Bruce, is bringing in used clothing banned? Over the years there have been newspaper articles to do with ukay-ukay syndicates and recently our shipper told us shipping used clothing was no longer allowed.

We wish you well in this endeavor and know you will help many truly in need. :tiphat: :thumbsup:

Edited January 22, 2013 by Old55

[Bruce]

Locally, there are Haitians who make the rounds buying in bulk to ship to Haiti for resale. There is also wholesale chothing places where you can buy used clothing by the pound. All packed in huge bales wrapped with wire like hay. All compacted into a 4' x maybe 6' bundle. No selection but for summer / winter clothing choices.

Little by little I will build up something that is self supporting.

[Bruce]

Bruce, is bringing in used clothing banned? Over the years there have been new paper articles to do with ukay-ukay syndicates and recently our shipper told us shipping used clothing was no longer allowed.

We wish you well in this endeavor and know you will help many truly in need. :tiphat: :thumbsup:

I have no intention of sending any clothes except used as packing material for more fragile items. I will sell the clothes locally in Florida as any Thrift Store would do, but since I am a not for profit, the income less expenses will go to the Philippines programs as cash.