Oxfam

[Yaloopy]

I was walking past Oxfam after it closed tonight. There was about 15 black refuse sacks full of books that were left there for the binmen. I'd seen these bags before, and people going through them, but I'd always assumed they were full of broken stuff. One of them was open this week so I had a look inside and they were all books in good condition, no rubbish. So I had a look through to see if there was anything good, and if I thought of it tomorrow I was gonna go in and complain.

Then some old woman who works there started banging on the window, shooing me away. I knocked on the door to ask her why they were chucking them all but she just waved me off. Back when I had a job for a newspaper I had to take a few pics in there, and I still had the contact details from one of the guys in head office in Dublin, so I emailed him just now to see if it's official policy to landfill all the books they don't sell or what. (It appears it is/was.)

I dunno, pissed me off a little bit; why the fuck would you donate if the stuff will be thrown out anyway? The couple of bags I looked through had a set of science books for kids, a set of encyclopedias, a bone-joint disease diagnoses book set for doctors, and a load of (shit, but sellable) chic-lit tat.

[slinks]

That's just how it is, the bigger a charity gets, the more full of shit they are. I used to have donations set up for action aid, till I realised what a load of wankers they are. I recomend supporting your local charities, whatever they might be. It's a lot easier to find out what's going on with your money/donations and who's benefitting from it. They're also a lot less likely to have big CEO's earning 10x what you're on.

[Shockwave]

Big charities are notirious for not giving a fuck. Just look at all the money that the RSPCA have and yet they still habitually destroy healthy anomals that they can't re-home.

As for the sort of people who work in these places, they do tend to attract a certain type of old hag.

When I was a courier I had to deliver catalogue stuff, my last route was in a place called Narberth and I have to say that everyone there was friendly and would take parcels for the neighbours, except the charity shop who clearly didn't give a fuck and wouldn't even take any mail for the people who lived in the flat above the shop (and were really nice people as I recall).

Those old crones give charities a bad name, and as for throwing all those unsalable books away, why not donate them to a country that has limited schooling so that someone can actually benefit from them.

[combatking0]

People keep bringing books to our Church fairs to sell, but we never sell as many as are brought in.

We were thinking of selling some of them online, but we're running out of space to keep them.

[Yaloopy]

throwing all those unsalable books away

People keep bringing books to our Church fairs to sell, but we never sell as many as are brought in.

Thing is, these books would sell if they dropped the price down a little. €3/4/5 a book in Oxfam versus 3-for-€2 or €1 in the other charities around the town. Oxfam is fairly busy as well. You'd think they'd at least bargain bin them for a week before they threw them away. And if they are getting rid of them, recycling.

why not donate them to a country that has limited schooling so that someone can actually benefit from them.

Local county library recently announced that it has no money for new stock. Plenty of schools in the third world, as you say. Hell, plenty of schools that would take half of them here.

[Clyde]

I've been in a few of the well known charity shops, and what gets me is you can't haggle their prices. I saw a Guiness Ash tray for £20 ( I love Guiness ), and it had a huge crack going around the middle, but when i asked could you knock off some money for the condition, the sales person said no you have to pay whats on the price tag, as our manager checks the condition of the items individually and marks as appropriate.

@Yaloopy: That really saddens me.

[Yaloopy]

Yep, Clyde, me too.

I know emailing Oxfam won't do much good, but at least I have an address for them that isn't info@ so maybe they'll give me some kinda statement that I can shove back in that old hag's face.

[Jim]

Throwing away books is a crime no matter who you are.

Jim

[combatking0]

We set our book prices at 10p to £1, but few people are interested.

Sending some of the more useful ones (not the Readers Digest ones) might be a good idea. I'll see what facilities are available to do this.

In fact, our local priest visits Uganda some times, and has links to one of the new schools going up there. He might be able to take some as hand luggage.

[slinks]

Throwing away books is a crime no matter who you are.

what if they're twilight books?

[Jim]

And anything by Dan Brown.  But the current British County Council habit for throwing books out of libraries and replacing them with computers that will be obsolete in two years is criminal.
Dan Brown - well, his books suck.  But someone will want to read them.  They will still be useful in 100 years.

Jim

[Yaloopy]

Reply to my email:

Hi Dan, re your enquiry, we do not ever bin saleable books!
 
Unfortunately, not all of the books donated are suitable for sale through our charity outlets.    The unsaleable clothing is recycled via specialist textile merchants who collect, sort, and dispose of it in a variety of ways.

So that covers them, I suppose.

One of the books yesterday was a perfect-quality Discworld novel, priced at €3.50. No way this wouldn't sell for a little less than that.

[Shockwave]

That sounds like a pile of shit to be honest with you.

How can they say that the books were unsaleable when you saw them with your own eyes and how did the Oxfam rep explain the shopkeepers shooing you away from the books in the first place.

I have been searching for the last half an hour to try and find some kind of public record of their policies and in particular the cash flow. I have failed so far.

[Yaloopy]

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/accounts/index.html <-which is bullshit. And there's not even anything close to that on the Irish site. I'd say what you should be looking at is the minimum amount of accounting standards that qualify for charity status on the IR website, and apply that to whatever amount of money Oxfam are making a year.