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 ...
This company will respond to the level of this disaster. A lot of you are going to have to make decisions above your level. Make the best decision that you can with the information that’s available to you at the time, and, above all, do the right thing.I don't know if this guy's still the CEO, but as long as he is, I'm cutting Wal-Mart slack.
--Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott, Jr., as Katrina bore down on the Gulf Coast.
She decided to start whining about something that had no bearing on her, her health or her well being.
Too many nosy scumbags out there looking for a reason to start complaining over matters that don’t effect them one way or another.
This chick manufactured outrage to puff herself up as a crusader against the heartless corporate monstrosity.
michael moore style attack liberalism at work.
The unions hate Walmart. They spread rumors that are happily gobbled up by the uninformed. They’ve been trying to unionize Walmart for years. Maybe H&M is non-union too.
Oops! I kinda used Goodwill as a generic name for all thrift stores.
However not all thrift stores are selling 7.00 shirts like the new suburban-friendly Goodwill’s. I wont even touch those places. They are total rip-offs.
I also dont mind if the place makes money off of their items. Many of the stores in my town use the money to fund missions, churches, food kitchens, and job training. They also have to keep the lights on.
“Just another WM bashing liberal.”
Exactly. I wonder what upscale clothiers do with unsold suits and dresses? I bet they don’t give them to the poor.
Doesn't that make the story a fabrication?
...
No one said anything about FORCED charity.
TALKING ABOUT THE RIGHT THING TO DO.
First, you can quit yelling at me. ;-P
Using public opinion/outrage/etc. to try and get a company to 'offer deep discounts' "IF they didn't want to donate" most certainly is "forced charity". Force does not necessarily emanate from the government.
To have such a "fire sale" regularly would change the business model and cycle for a store. Their customers would stop purchasing at "regular" prices, and would instead only patronize the deep discount sales. To make it contingent on showing income is very, very likely illegal.
You are correct that private charity is always preferable to government handouts, but "charity" is a gift that is given - and not one that can be taken, such as your original post implied.
Finally, Walmart following through on the terms of their contracts (when they stipulate destruction of merchandise) is explicitly "doing the right thing".
There is your problem right there. Raise the tax on the poorest to discourage being poor. They'll stop being poor or flee the city and NY will have less poor people. Seems to be the solution for all other social manipulations that statist taxes are used for.
Wal-Mart does this all the time. You can buy end of season stuff for pennies on the dollar at Wal-Mart.
“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.”
Yeah, and the author wants to “boo hoo” about how bad these retailers are—instead misses the point that ONE-THIRD of the population is poor! You want to whine about something, whine about how your socialist thug government in NY is a complete failure and disaster. Your stifling enslaving burden of taxes is the first place to look. You want to help people? Then quit stealing their money!
Our Walmart has a number isles devoted to markdowns. They used to have pretty good deals. I often cruise them to check prices and now I see very small reductions in price from the original shelf price.
I like Walmart, but they are counting on people that don’t pay attention to prices to snap up their markdown goods because they are in the markdown isle. It must be working.
I remember a few years ago, when photos were published of the cast offs from some Planned Parenthood Clinics. The outrage wasn’t focused at PP, but at the folks who went through their trash, and distributed photos of the deceased unborn. Planned Parenthood= Good. Dead babies-good, pictures of them- bad. Walmart=Bad. Coats with holes poked in them=bad. Pictures of cast off coats=Good.
The Walmart stores here donate to the various local charities. I saw it first hand when I worked at a children’s home. It was like Christmas morning when they were distributed to the kids and staff. What wasn’t used was then donated to the local thrift store.
I agree. The stuff could be sold at liquidation prices to an eBay seller, who might be a stay at home mother trying to make ends meet. It could be donated to St. Vincent de Paul or Goodwill. The warm coats and gloves could be put to the use for which they were intended. But just the idea of wasting all that material and all that labor is truly abhorrent to me.
Count your blessings. My local Goodwill is waay over-priced. So is the other so-called thrift store, St. Vinnie's. I've seen stuff, like housewares, in both stores, priced in excess of new price.
Why not sell it at liquidation prices in the store?
Your comments rang a bell with me. I had a job as security manager in a store of one of the biggest chains in Canada. Now taken over in Canada, the name no longer. Also in America. The position which of course nobody cared about at the current time, except the security manager was of "shrinkage". The system mandated that all slightly tarnished packages must be recorded and shipped somewhere or other.
No employee wanted to do paper work "on the floor" hence a massive amount monthly of goods being "junked". A decision was made to give toys (a favourite area of package opening and leaving) to the local Sally Ann. Great train set and all.
Later some of these goods turned up with some "indignant" customer, claiming a refund and getting it. The staff asked for a receipt and management told them "the customer is always right", don't ask to aggressively. (Yeah right!)
Excuse the screed, but a lot of words to describe the cleverest people on earth. The wonderful customers who know every trick in the book.
Sheer frustration afterward and to the incinerator, was the practice. Shrinkage was allowed at one and a half percent of volume. Ours ended up at nearly five percent shrinkage. (My demise).
Agreed. Like dumping perfectly good food into the dumpster. It’s not like there aren’t organizations and distribution networks to take these goods off their hands. Our tax code has been designed to encourage charity even on the part of business. No excuse.
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