The ultimate social network: Goodwill
October 14th, 2006Wouldn’t it be neat if Goodwill offered an opt-in service that let you know when your donated items had been purchased? Or, as a buyer, you could see the life cycle of the item you are purchasing. I think it would keep people more involved with the donation process, and make it feel less like an alternative to the dump.
My old excuse for shopping at Goodwill was because it was cheap, my new excuse is that it is sustainable. Post-consumer products! Woo woo!
October 14th, 2006 at 6:44 pm
Hey — it is sustainable that’s true. So it’s a good idea :)
But letting sellers know when their stuff was purchased has the problem that they would get disappointed seeing that maybe half of what they gave was eventually thrown away if it couldn’t be resold.
For buyers, believe me, you don’t want to know where some things come from. Most of the times it’s just stuff that somebody’s mom did not like in her closet anymore. But effectively, for the rest of the products it would make them impossible to sell to anyone, when it turns out it’s a product that maybe belonged to a person who died (people will find that creepy) or similar things.
The good thing about goodwill is that people give and receive anonymously.
Even though I personally wouldn’t mind too much (it would even be interesting), I think taking away this anonymity would do Goodwill more harm than good.
October 14th, 2006 at 6:54 pm
but but but … the person who originally purchased the shirt I am wearing must have had similiar taste, maybe we could be friend! :P
October 15th, 2006 at 8:20 pm
People donate WAY more stuff than Goodwill can sell… a lot of the stuff that gets donated goes to warehouses where it is sorted into huge bales of things like “womens blouses” and “mens jeans” and then shipped to places like Eastern Europe sub-Saharan Africa where things items sell for a buck or two. Some countries have banned imports of used American clothing just because they don’t want our gross castoffs. Also, sometimes white teeshirts that get donated to Goodwill that aren’t suitable for wear are cut up and used as dustcloths in factories, and other unusable textiles are ground up into filler. There are also mills in Italy that recycle the wool from old sweaters into new yarn for new sweaters.
So, chances are when you give something to Goodwill, it might never end up being worn again, or worn by someone far, far away. Of course, I like your idea because I have yet to make any Zambian friends.