Op shop pleads for clean contributions

Marlborough charity shop donors are reminded to show some courtesy to the volunteers’ sorting donated items after increased numbers of “disgusting” donations.

Acting Blue Door manager Lynda Larsen says the past weeks have left the Blenheim second-hand shop feeling that people are using their storefront more as a dump for unusable items out of hours than as a place to donate items for resale.

“There is a vast difference between unneeded and unusable, and we need to push stuff through the shop to fund our community support while reusing and recycling what we can,” says Lynda.

“We need items to be washed before donating as we don’t have those facilities, but having people empty garages of mouldy clothes, stained mattresses or dirty sheets by dumping and running instead of seeing staff is inconsiderate to our volunteers’ efforts.

“Honestly, one man’s trash is sometimes just trash ... and it is frustrating as for us dumping anything more than a binful takes funds away from our community focus.

“People can get quite mean and rude when we turn them down, and our volunteers are not here to be given a hard time either - it’s disrespectful and lacking courtesy.

“I had a gentleman in here with old seats beyond repair who came to us after already going to the dump shop, the proper end of the line, and it made me ask him well, why would you come here after being turned down there?”

Anonymous Blue Door volunteers say that while donations are always interesting to open, they can quickly see when a donation is really a health hazard.

“In saying that, I love doing this and seeing what people throw away because it’s fun to figure out the person who, for example, had such a lovely wardrobe,” they comment.

“But we’re increasingly receiving stuff that people have left the garage for years and years that have moths, spiders and cockroaches in them which is just disgusting stuff we shouldn’t have to deal with.

“Some of the dumping is so blatant, where they’ve come to get rid of items.”
While the increase in subpar donations has been frustrating, Lynda says that the Blue Door is incredibly grateful for donations coming in the correct way.

“People come here for a bargain, and we get some beautiful items that we want people to have the opportunity of sniffling around, but I really want to stick up for charity shops on this because it’s a dirty business at the best of times,” she says.