Giving Clutter a New Life: How to donate used stuff to charity

by Kim, February 23, 2009 at 8:00am

New Dream is always looking for win-win situations: ways to help the environment while not breaking your budget; ways to help you get more of what matters while consuming less. Knowing that economic downturns tend to mean a downturn in charitable giving, I started looking for ways to connect people with charities accepting in-kind donations, meaning that it's a coveted quadruple win: charities get donations to those who need them, donors get a less-cluttered house, landfills get a break from all the stuff diverted from the trash, and little to no money is needed to get this chain of events going.

This is a little like a section from TreeHugger's forum "What To Do With (hard-to-recycle-items)" , but unlike their postings, I want to focus the solutions just on charitable destinations for used goods. After all, the solution to the economic crisis may not be only through a greater influx of cash to needed areas...volunteerism, which is a type of gift-in-kind, is another potent force for good.

Please comment with charities you know of that accept used, hard to recycle goods as donations. For right now, please stick to national charities or places that accept donations online, as a list of local charities will become unwieldy very quickly.The idea is not to divert commonly accepted stuff like clothes from your local thrift store, but to direct specific items, like hearing aids, to places dedicated to their distribution. The results will be put into a well-organized page that displays destinations for used goods at a glance.

I'll start off with an item that plagues my own apartment: school supplies. Somehow I've collected dozens of rulers, pencils, pens, folders, even a protractor, and of course I feel guilty throwing everything "out." Now consider how many school supplies a kid goes through in a year...it sets parents back a pretty penny.  The average teacher, however, spends over $650 of their own money to buy classroom materials.

ILoveSchools.com accepts new and used school supplies. Search their national database to find a school accepting used musical instruments, science equipment, sports equipment, or office supplies.

Have any suggestions for national charities accepting gently used, hard to recycle items? Please post them below.