Imagine your in-laws or your best friend leaving a box on your doorstep filled with an unwashed white T-shirt worn while picking raspberries, a cookie jar with a broken lid, Gladware plastic caked with egg yolk, and a toaster that sparks. You’re told that after a little presoaking, elbow grease and tinkering, all will be in nearly new condition.
Welcome to the daily grind at any local charity.
On any given day at Goodwill/Easter Seals Minnesota, about 15 to 20 percent of items received are not suitable to be sold in their stores, said marketing director Brian Becker. While the vast majority of donations are salable and deeply appreciated, said Becker, Goodwill in Minnesota spends about $600,000 a year on trash removal, or about 3 percent of annual sales. It’s money that charities would prefer to use on their good deeds, not the garbage.
This is a real problem. I used to volunteer sorting donated baby clothes at a crisis pregnancy center in Minneapolis. While most of the donated goods were in fine shape, I was often astonished at what some people thought the poor ought to be wearing. Stained, torn clothing with missing buttons, sometimes dirty, sometimes reeking of cigarette smoke or urine. And we didn’t have space to "host" all the clothing we got, anyway, so most of that stuff was thrown away.
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