Not sure if this is useful to the thread or not, but thought I`d share some `insider secrets`. I volunteered for a `well known` Charity shop for just over a year & was surprised at how it was run. The price guide for starters was frightening!, An item of clothing was judged if it was Market/ high street/ catalogue/ designer/ supermarket. They had `year on year` sales (just like in Asda!, & targets for donated/ gift aided or new goods sales per day/ week. If sales were `down` (had to be roughly £150-200 per day) & it was due to the weather rain, sleet or snow....the Manager was told "People still had to shop, so that was no excuse". It was all very ruthless!. I didn`t get paid `travelling expenses & you`re allowed 30 mins lunch. Of course I choose to volunteer, but decided to leave after I was told, by putting out a Hand written sign explaining there was a `sale on books` ( which had been there for months, which then sold & boosted the total sales by quite a lot!), was "against" company policy!
I was keeping out of this thread because of bias, I'm an ex-charity manager and ex- charity shop manager (and my wife is also a charity shop manager).
But this comment did touch a nerve, volunteering for a year in a charity shop does not really give insider knowledge, it gives some insight based on the limited access to information that you may have had.
Most charity shops exist on turnover of £4,000 per week or less, most retaillers will know that a high street store would need to do double that to make it really viable.
The majority of that income would be spent on the shop, rent, utilities, etc and staff wages (most do employ at least 1 full-time manager and 1 part time deputy), probably 40% of the income would be passed on to the charity for the charitable work they do.
A business cannot be a charity, charity shops are just a fundraising mechanism, one of the many routes to generating income that they use.
Without charity shops, the high street would be a less than attractive street scene, with many more for sale signs than we have now.
Charity shops employ thousands of people around the country, who then spend their cash in the shops of other retaillers.
Where charity shops do sell new goods, where do they get them? other companies who sell to the trade....
Charity shops do use volunteers, but they also provide valuable training to young people, people with learning difficulties and opportunity for people on community service orders to repay the community....but they also pay tax and NHI, they dont get a pass on those.
Where charity shops sell new goods they have to pay VAT like the rest of us, adding to the public purse.
There are pro's and con's in the debate about rate relief, no amount of debate will resolve it, some will agree some wont.
