CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Goodwill sees a trend when it comes to the amount of items that are being donated around the holiday season.
In the donation room, employees sift through items to decide what goes out on the floor, and the week after Christmas, donations go up so that way people can get credit on their taxes before the end of the year.
However, seasons and days of the week also affect the amount of people coming in to buy. Saturdays bring in the most amount of people because Goodwill has its half-off sale.
“This year we’re very fortunate that we have a sale Saturday the day after Christmas,” Marjorie Boudreaux, the Vice President Marketing Goodwill South Texas said.
Boudreaux said that after the holiday season, Goodwill sees an influx of donations which enables people to clean out their closets and make room for new gifts they receive for Christmas.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic also contributes to the rise in donations.
“During shutdown, when people were staying home…. which they should’ve been staying home and they did….we received an influx in donations. People were staying home and cleaning out their closets,” Boudreaux said.
Some people find thrift shopping to be a great way to save money through the economic crisis.
“Goodwill is definitely somewhere that we go often…the whole family…definitely makes our dollar stretch like I said…and yeah…we enjoy it,” said Nick Folistad, a Goodwill shopper.
Items are organized by color and size and are rotated out by the color of the tag which denotes a discount. If they are not sold by the fourth or fifth week, they are sent to the clearance store where they are sold by the pound. Some shoppers come in hoping they will find something from the previous season.
“Right now I was just searching for Fall items. I know Fall has already passed…well you know decorating for Halloween and that. I really wanted to buy some and I came here and there was an explosion of stuff,” said Tillie Michaels, another Goodwill shopper.
The store that receives the most donations is the location on Staples and Saratoga. The store where the most people buy is the Annaville location.
Goodwill also helps the community through its “Lets-Get-Back-to-Work” program that teaches the unemployed digital skills like how to navigate the internet, set up an email, and make a resume so they can find a job that interests them.
