Most non-consumable items that I buy are second hand. In fact the
concept of buying many of them new has become a bit foreign to me,
I'm so much in the habit of just making do until I stumble upon
them used. Disregarding Ebay and friends due to postage costs
(hardly anything is ever close enough to me to be picked up with
reasonable expenditure of fuel and effort) and competition, the key
resource for such cheap individuals as myself in Australia are
Opportunity Shops, more often referred to as Op Shops. This term
may translate to "charity shop" or "goodwill" in other countries,
though I really haven't a clue about that. Over here though, these
stores are run by some form of charity, from local groups to
well-known global organisations. Their stock is donated, and sold
on very cheaply.
Now I do this just because I'm cheap. Even when I can easily afford
to buy something new I prefer to get a cheaper second-hand one,
because why not? Also the second-hand item might be a better brand
than I would buy new or simply better made than anything available
today. But while thinking about the whole system of how Op Shops
work, I realised another, possibly more dignified, reason why
someone might choose to shop at them.
This person would have some objection, probably ethical, to the
support of an entire industry. An easy example would be the
clothing industry, where almost all western manufacturers are gone
and apparantly replaced by sweatshop labour. This happened because
consumers ignored the ethical issues and bought the cheapest,
shaping the direction of the whole industry so that now it's
difficult to purchase a desired type of item without in turn
supporting the unethical operators. The concerned shopper might buy
second-hand clothes from Ebay or a commercial second-hand clothes
store (I only know that these exist because I saw it in a
documentary a while back). But as the original purchaser likely
sold the clothes to them for some money, it's possible that they
considered this at the time of originally purchasing the clothes,
and it could have contributed to their decision to purchase them in
the first place. They might even consider the ease of later resale
as an incentive to buy from that brand again. Therefore by buying
the item second-hand you could still in some way be supporting the
original manufacturer.
If the clothes were donated though, then the original purchaser
has, shall I say 'worn', the full cost of the item. Economically
the clothes are back at square one, their value now channelled
wholely towards the charity running the Op Shop where they are
resold.
The same can be said for anything that might be bought from an Op
Shop - from books, to furniture, to kitchen appliances.
Going further than just picky consumers, any genuine
capitalism-haters who haven't been put off by the failures of most
alternative "isms" through the previous century, should find Op
Shops a convenient way to avoid contributing to the capitalist
society. The businesses that make the goods never see any benefit
from your purchase, and the organisation that does get your money
distributes it for the public good. It's sort of half the loop of
communism really. In fact if you're on the dole in Australia I
think some people can stay on it if they do charity work. So if you
work at the Op Shop, the government gives you a standard amount of
money for it, and you spend your money on goods at the Op Shop,
then you're getting pretty close to communism. If lots of people
chose to do that then there wouldn't be enough donations to meet
demand, but with all of the free workers the charity might be able
to manufacture their own goods. Eventually I suppose the government
would go broke from not getting enough tax income to pay for so
many people being on the dole, and their money all being spent with
a tax-exempt organisation. The government collapses, and the
charity takes over. The Op Shop revolution!
OK maybe I'm getting a bit carried away. I don't really see the old
ladies that run the country town Op Shop nearest to me waving a red
flag in Canberra. The point is though that you hear a lot of people
complaining about the companies that make things they buy, and
here's a genuine way to avoid the problem. Also I seriously doubt
that many of the people making these complaints, or beleiving in
the far left, actually shop at Op Shops. I don't know for sure, but
somehow I just don't think they would.
Tip shops are much the same thing, if your lucky enough to have one
at your local tip / transfer station. Here it's generally not so
clear where the profits of the store go, but like Op Shops the
financial connection to the manufacturer is well and truely gone by
the time goods are plucked from a skip full of rubbish. They're
much less common than Op Shops here in rural Victoria, but I know
they sometimes get some really good stuff through, it's a shame
that the nearest one to me is just too far out of my way.
To finish up, some Op Shop hunting tips:
*Some are reluctant to sell electronics. Generally the smaller
ones running out of some tumble-down building down a back street
will sell you whatever they get (at least the ones in the country
towns), but the more organised ones from the bigger charities are
often too scared of being sued if someone gets electrocuted from a
faulty device. The latter ones might still have electrical goods
out the back, so it can be worth asking especially if you're after
something specific like a vintage computer or video game console.
*If you're after something specific, it can be worth asking about
anything out the back. There's often a mountain of stuff waiting
out there to be sorted or priced.
*Those tumble-down ones in the back streets usually don't follow
anything like normal business hours. Don't travel too far assuming
that they'll be open if you don't know their exact hours (or for
that matter, if you don't know for sure they they follow them).
Also if you drive by in the middle of the day and see they're open
don't assume that they still will be when you come back a little
while later, some only go for a few hours a week.
*Don't try to bargain with the price - it's a charity you
heartless monster! Just roll your eyes at the nick-nack that you'd
quite like but wouldn't have been worth new the $10 price tag that
some unknowledgeable volunteer put on it. You might find something
else that you'd expect to pay $20 for but only costs $5, in which
case overall you've still won.
*Bring cash. Again at least with the little country ones it's
unlikely that they'll accept cards. More likely sales records are
written down in pencil, and change stored in old tins. I always use
cash anyway so this isn't a problem for me.
*It probably helps for motivation to have something you expect to
find and buy. So that it doesn't feel a waste of time going into a
few and not finding anything, or being tempted to by things mainly
just to justify the visit. I have my VHS tape collection, which has
the added benefit from VHS tapes often being about the cheapest
items that they sell. Sometimes they're even free.
