Posted on 01/08/2010 7:02:35 AM PST by Scythian
This unsettling discovery was made by graduate student Cynthia Magnus outside the back entrance of H&M on 35th street in New York City. Just a few doors down, she also found hundreds of Wal-Mart tagged items with holes made in them that were dumped by a contractor. On December 7, she spotted 20 bags of clothing outside of H&M including, "gloves with the fingers cut off, warm socks, cute patent leather Mary Jane school shoes, maybe for fourth graders, with the instep cut up with a scissor, men’s jackets, slashed across the body and the arms. The puffy fiber fill was coming out in big white cotton balls.”
The New York Times points out that one-third of the city's population is poor, which makes this behavior not only wasteful and sad, but downright irresponsible. Wal-Mart spokeswoman, Melissa Hill, acted surprised that these items were found, claiming they typically donate all unworn merchandise to charity. When reporters went around the corner from H&M to a collections drop-off for charity organization New York Cares, spokesperson Colleen Farrell said, “We’d be glad to take unworn coats, and companies often send them to us."
(Excerpt) Read more at shine.yahoo.com ...
I'm sure it is done completely privately. As for advantage... If you knew that you could go to a donation center to get clothes free instead of purchasing them, isn't that what you'd do? They are matching their supply to their demand.
Of course, there are other ways of doing it, such as selling to a last-resort retailer in mixed lots, that probably would maximize both social good (people would get the clothes cheap) and profit (the store would get low, but better than scrap prices for the excess goods.)
I agree it is a PR blunder.
Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins in Cabinet positions.
I’ll bet insurance or unions are involved.
“Pity the ‘Charity’ that gets damaged and ‘unwanted’/unsold not-so-goods from Wal-Mart.”
EXACTLY. Can’t you see the headlines now?? “WM Gives Cheap Clothing to Goodwill, Saves the Good Stuff for Customers”
Maybe these guys should go through all Ny’ers’ trash cans to make sure they aren’t being wasteful. Did Bloomberg eat all his veggies last week, or did some go in the trash? How about Sarah Jessica Parker, did she throw away some old baby socks that could have gone to Goodwill??
They slaughtered milk cows to keep the price of milk from going through the floor. They slaughtered chickens too. And let tons upon tons of fruit rot, to keep the price up.
Guess what’s going to happen to the price of clothing?
Food? Milk? Fruit? Energy?
Add inflation on top of the shortages....And of course the taxes that will be confiscated from your paychecks.
Future doesn’t look as bright. And yes, they did the same things during the Depression.
You have just shown you lack of understanding regarding the current state of our Job market.
Americans have always been the most generous and careing people.
You must be a Libertarian.
Stepping over fellow Americans in need due to the Dumocrat Economy.
Why don’t you call your local charity and find out what they need to provide for the unemployed and underemployed.
Your post speaks for itsself.
Sad.
Americans pull together when the Country is in peril.
That's kind of like what Burlington Coat Factory is, an outlet store for Macy's.
And Goodwill sells them. Have you ever walked into one of their stores and look around? Many of their clothing prices are around the same, or just below walmart prices. They arent doing anyone any favors.
REAL poor people cant even afford their prices. I think the clothing should be donated to places that wont be making money on them. I am SURE there must be many places that give things to needy families..not sell them..give them.
Was actually thinking of the unplesant task for that 'Charity' to have sort through the 'donations' aka 'junk' by most MO's at that point; and in turn; then having the burden for them to dispose of the 'unwanted good'.
There are naked poor people? Not a sight to see as most poor people in America are fat. We've gone overboard on the charity, to the point of incentivizing people to be poor.
When W-M enters into an agreement to purchase products, they normally include the idea of the company buying back unsold goods. It could be the selling companies decided it was cheaper to have W-M destroy the product rather than pay to have them shipped back and restock the products.
So you favor forcing Walmart’s “charity”?
“Forced charity” is an oxymoron.
oops; knocked the plural off. That is, ‘unwanted goods’. . .
Wanna know something even more disturbing? Sams and WalMart MUST trash good food on the expiration date. Such as bakery items- on the expire date MOUNTAINS of cakes, pies, breads etc( all perfectly edible) go into the dumpster. Not on sale for half price- in the garbage! Not even cut up for the employees or given to homeless shelters- in the garbage!
More shocking- if food leaves the store even for a moment and is returned, in the trash it goes. Saw it with my own eyes- woman bought two hams, walked out the door, changed her mind and returned one Employee asked if she should return it to the cold case and she was told to trash it. Saw it happen with a cake too- it had been mis-decorated for a birthday order. Customer refused it because of the kids name being misspelled. In the garbage.
This happens at places like Winn Dixie too. They used to put near-expired bakery items in a basket for half price. Now they pile them on a handtruck and put them in the dumpster. Appalling waste when they could get SOMETHING for them and people could save a bit of money for good food.
I love Wal Mart, and Sams, but this is wrong. I could almost see the liablity factor re food,( even then you could have a sign-off on liability arrangement with charities or something) but CLOTHES and shoes? Sell them for a dollar at a sidewalk sale or something! I saw a dumpster full of shoes behind a mall once, all sprayed with orange and red paint. Criminal!
Seems like an opportunity for someone to learn a trade like sewing/tailoring?
Since they’re already in the garbage, pull out the items and track down some needle and thread!
No one said anything about FORCED charity.
TALKING ABOUT THE RIGHT THING TO DO.
Private charity is always preferrable to Government handouts.
““You can bet the other side of the coin is that if they “donate” them to the homeless, “poor”, etc., in good condition, they will just get sold on the street for drug money.....it happens all the time with donations for the “needy”, from Craigslist and elsewhere.....I’VE SEEN IT HAPPENINNG IN THIS AREA FOR A LONG TIME. Same thing at the Salvation Army and Goodwill sites; the city-dwellers come in droves to buy suburbanites’ donations, so they can sell them on Ebay or on the street.”
Ooookay. Um, I know some people that buy the stuff, sell it on Ebay, and then use the money to pay bills and build savings, you know instead of waiting around for Uncle Sam to take care of them. No shame in that.
Welcome to that “shady” world of capitalism.
Geesh!
“
I do that with camera gear from the Starvation Army and other charities. The charities get paid, it pays for my hobby, and it bought my daughters college textbooks.
The office where I work destroys used gear or gear we can’t sell. We’ll grab parts that are good but the rest goes in the dumpster. Up to and including a $100K high end digital color printer with a Fiery RIP.
Or TJ Maxx is for a lot of chains, and Marshall's is for what TJ can't get rid of.
“I kinda wish I had a better story about it but I’m also kinda glad I wasn’t totally embarassed.”
Yeah, if you’d been doing the Cossack Dance or even the Hokey Pokey it would have been classic.
But not being the one thing people remember about a wedding is a good thing, too.
:)
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