CHARITY BAGS

nevermind :D We gets loads of these - gave all I can give now so like you I use them for free bin liners :)))

Lol Sheilar,glad someone else admits to using the bags for bin liners..I thought it was just me..:o)

We get lots aswell. I use them to cover my half-finished clay pots :o)

We must be (un)lucky. We get about one a year.

I get about 4 a week, I discard them. I do not trust them. I give most things I no longer want to my church who then distribute them to the community, I sometime take a few bags to my local Salvation Army charity shop, where I can see them being sold, sometimes I get fed up giving stuff to the charity shops as they charge too much.. not much money go to charity, when I give to my church they are given away FREE, which I prefer best!

Never mind Sheila, you had good intentions. We get loads of those bags too and I always find another use for them, usually as bin bags.

They also make good leaf mould collecters as most have holes in them, we get loads every week so I don`t feel guilty when I put them to a different use....

Well it tells you if you're not filling it, to leave the empty bag outside and it will get collected - a joke I think. They end up on the garden, soaking wet and get dumped in the bin, so I 're-cycle' them into kitchen bin liners! lol

i use mine as rubbish bags and take things i no longer need to salvation army or a local charity that helps homeless. i did once fill the bag ~ only to watch the people collecting them, sling them into a van ~ anything breakable smashed on impact!!! that was the last time i put anything out in a bag for charity!!!

Oh....I thought they only collected clothes/shoes these days....because of the potential breakages :-

It is Clothes here..At least four times a week..I type naked...

that was a while ago ~ you are probably right AA ~ nothing was said about what you could or couldnt include then, it just put me off when i saw how little they bothered ~ it was just the same as the bin men throwing rubbish on the lorry.

better be careful they dont take you away too pimpernel.

Our local British Heart Foundation has a big ex furniture store in the city centre. In this shop they sell furniture, beds, electricals and other big items. All the electricals have been tested and approved and have a sticker on them to that effect. They also do china, mirrors, pictures and loads of other breakable stuff, so I think some of the charities still collect breakables. If I've got breakables to get rid of, I walk up to our local Sue Ryder shop to ensure they don't get broken.

We hardly ever get charity bags here in NZ. In my previous home I think we may have got about four over the eight years we lived there, & none here at all, & we've been in this house since March. When they do come, they are always red plastic. Our rubbish bags are yellow plastic .... & we have to buy them from the supermarket & not cheap. If we want to use the big bins I used to use in England, they cost quite a lot each month from a private business. What we do get a lot of is junk mail! Huge quantities stuffed into the letterbox, so that the normal mail can't get in. A lot of people now have notices on the letterboxes stating "No Junk Mail". Sometimes that works. Sometimes it doesn't.

We only get about 1 week nowadays rather than 4 but I don't use them as bin liners as they have holes in. I put them in with the carrier bag recycling at the supermarket. Occasionally I fill one up if I get fed up with all the stuff cluttering up the boot of my car for ages waiting to be dropped off at a charity shop with parking nearby. We're not short of charity shops but most require too long a walk when carrying a heavy sack. I must remember to do it in small loads every time I'm passing on foot.

I too gets lots of them and use them for the bin. :)
I take any unwanted items to a local charity shop where I buy stuff too :))

Just realised, while reading this blog and the comments, that now I live in Spain I miss the charity bags .... NOT! I haven't ever seen a charity shop in any of the towns either, whereas in my Essex town every other shop on the High Street was a Charity Shop. I can't say Spaniards are not charitable - they'll share anything with a friend. Maybe the tough Franco years taught people to hang on to everything "in case" or simply the tough life taught people to recycle?

Oh I love charity shops! Nothing like a good rummage through stuff others throw out!

Oh Pimpernel - my eyes are watering! Hope it's not too cold there!
We don't get charity begging letters or bags here. There is a big "Caritas" bin up with the rubbish and recycling bins in the town carpark, and people put anything and everything they think might be useful into it-mostly clothing and shoes. There are no charity shops here, either, which I miss. We used to take our unwanted stuff to the nearest "mercato antiquatario" and ask the owners to donate the proceeds to charity, but we found out that they were pocketing the proceeds, so we now take the proceeds ourselves and give it to the priest or our local animal refuge.
I really enjoy the British charity shops, although there are far too many of them now, and patronise them as often as I can when I'm back there (especially for jigsaws!).

yes there are hundreds of them! I always stick with the known ones though..never know who is AT it! :)

I use them as bin liners aswell.

Well I suppose I'm one of the lucky ones, not being on a street ,don't get charity bags.Noone can be bothered to walk up onto the allotment to find our home.Only sometimes it would be nice to be remembered as we miss out on other things as well.

I must confess that I totally adore charity shops too Pixi25. We call them Op shops in NZ (short for Opportunity shops, as people think the word charity is not politically correct anymore). I often donate bags of things to them, but the problem is that I can never resist having a look around, & end up coming back with at least one item, & often more, which makes my OH really laugh. When I lived near West Wycome in Bucks, my favourite place to go every 3 weeks was the huge Sue Ryder secondhand market at Nettlebed (I think that is in Oxfordshire?). I don't think I ever missed it for years.

we get lots to and even though i know they need these things and i do give to charity, i also think the cost of making these bags etc takes money away from the charity itself, much more cost affective to put leaflets through and people will bag things themselves if anything to give. moan over lol

I have rung the numbers on the bags sometimes but with no answer. Our council wanted us to report bogus charities. All they have to do is wait for the van to arrive on the day that's written on the bag .The Heart Foundation sent me a big thank you letter after I left my post code and number on their bag ticking I am a tax payer. My bit of junk made them £64 .
Our local YMCA now have two shops in High Wycombe and if you have ANYTHING that they can sell ( must be good nick and not the Mrs) they will collect free of charge from your house.All of the electrical stuff is fully checked. You must ask them by law if they carry a licence to carry the goods and you sign a form to say it's the goods that you arranged for collection over the phone. They just took a three and a two seater sofa that I know has already been sold towards their charity. I also found a site to donate furniture to people less fortunate than me . Beats paying £30 plus to the council for a special collection . If you hold a jumble sale do you know you could get more money for the old rag. You could get £1.50 a cwt for dry rags in the 70s.

Tommy, in the past when I had nothing to donate, I put the unused bag back out at the door but it never got collected as it stated on the wrapper and ended up soaking wet and/or blowing over the garden, that's why I use them now as bin liners.

When Mam died three years ago, my brothers emptied all her clothing into bin liners and took them to the local charity shop (to save me getting upset at sorting her clothes), where they apologised to the staff as they had put drawers, bras and all sorts into the bags. The ladies in the shop said not to worry about it as whatever clothing they could not sell was weighed and they were paid for it as 'rags'.

I agree Sheilar, They never come and collet to bags, and they blow around all over the place, I just throw them away, but i will remember what you said about turning them inside out. good idea :)

I call it re-cycling Sue! lol

Hehe:))))))