Tag: clothing donation pickup

How Your Clothing Donations Support Veterans

Posted on by Jordank

The Organizing Blog regularly informs readers about the benefits of #decluttering. But did you know that your #donations of lightly used clothing, kitchen items, small appliances and other household goods help fund thousands of veterans programs and initiatives nationwide?

When you contact ClothingDonations.org and make a donation, affiliates of the Vietnam Veterans Association (VVA) pick up that extra junk and resell it in bulk to qualified thrift and secondhand retailers throughout the country. It then takes the money and invests it in programs benefiting veterans and their communities at the local, state and national level.

VVA’s first priority is to help veterans access the healthcare and other benefits to which they are entitled after serving. Some two-thirds of all veterans never interact with the Veterans Administration, missing out on benefits they have earned, and VVA service officers help them navigate the often-confusing benefits claims process.

Funds from contributions also help VVA representatives lobby for and against legislation that would help or harm veterans. Last year, for example, the organization pushed for passage of the Blue Water Navy Act, which would extend healthcare benefits to Navy service members affected by toxic chemical exposures.

VVA offers numerous outreach programs to ensure that veterans are supported long after their service. These sections are targeted to groups such as POW/MIAs, homeless and incarcerated veterans, minority and women veterans, and veterans suffering from PTSD, substance abuse and Agent Orange exposure.

Your donations help VVA’s national membership of more than 70,000 at the local level, too. More than 650 chapters in the United States and its overseas territories use money earned through charitable donations to support college scholarships, help individual veterans facing sudden hardships, and participate in memorial observances.

When you #donate your extra stuff to ClothingDonations.org, it goes toward countless programs that help millions of veterans thrive and give back. We appreciate every bag and box, and thank you for your support!

Celebrate Your Independence From Clutter

Posted on by Jordank

If you’d like to celebrate the 4th of July in a nonflammable, indoor manner, try declaring your independence from #clutter with 7 Tips from Tailored Living. First, you must admit that there is a problem, then set house rules asking every family member to pick up after themselves. Next, eliminate unnecessary items from each room, putting stuff that doesn’t belong in a particular place where it should be and getting rid of items that no longer serve a useful purpose. Purge the closets and garage and contact ClothingDonations.org for a #donation pickup. Finally, make an honest assessment of your storage needs to maximize the space you have for the remaining stuff.

Get the Kids to Declutter on Their Summer Vacation

Posted on by Jordank

School’s out (for the summer)! And if you have kids, that means you’ll be looking for something to keep them busy for six or eight hours on most weekdays. Summer camp, a family vacation and other diversions are great options, but they can’t fill every one of those hours fast enough. This summer, get your kids involved in a good #decluttering.

You can already hear the collective groan you might hear as you suggest such a chore. But if you organize and incentivize the task, you might find that it gets done faster and more completely — and then everyone can really enjoy the summer fun.

Set a goal; the Making Lemonade blog suggests a summertime target of reducing stuff by one-third. Kids tend to accumulate lots of toys, clothing and other junk that they outgrow quickly, leading to overstuffed closets and drawers, so extra stuff should be easy to weed out. Put each of them in in charge of choosing what to keep.

Find a rainy day or quiet weekend to have everyone pitch in and declutter their personal spaces, or simply set a deadline. As an incentive, put a garage or yard sale on the calendar; anything that the kids are able to declutter and sell will mean extra money in their pockets — money they can spend on whatever they wish.

Toys can present an especially challenging decluttering task, says Simply Well Balanced. Sort them into categories — building toys, stuffed animals, craft supplies, etc. — and ask your child to keep only a limited number of favorites. Those few items will go back to the closets and shelves, and the rest will be bagged and boxed for sale or #donation. Anything broken or unusable can go directly into the trash.

After you hold your sale and distribute the proceeds, you can box up the leftover clothing, toys and other household items and schedule a ClothingDonations.org pickup. A driver will stop by on the appointed day, load up your stuff and leave a donation receipt for tax purposes. That lightly used merchandise will then be resold to fund veterans’ programs.

This, in itself, can be a lesson in personal responsibility for younger children, decluttering coach Gari Julius Weilbacher told WHYY. “It’s wonderful to teach kids from a young age about making meaningful donations. Involving kids in packing up the books, toys and clothes that they are no longer using can engage them in the process.”

Get Ready for Garage Sale Season

Posted on by Jordank

The weather is finally heating up in many parts of the country that suffered a long and inclement winter and spring. A dreary spring is great for spring cleaning, of course, but are you ready to make the most of the new season — garage sale season?

Here’s hoping that you have been able to go through your home room by room to sort out some of the excess junk you’ve accumulated over the months and years. If you haven’t given that stuff away already, now’s the time to make some money off it.

To get your sale ready, get everything you want to sell in one place. There are some things that will need to be trashed, of course, but you may be surprised at what people will want to buy, says FrugalFun.com.

“Try to sell everything! What’s junk to one person is often someone else’s treasure. Even broken appliances can be sold for parts. And don’t throw out your old magazines. Stick them all in a box and sell them for a quarter apiece.”

Arrange your selling space — whether it’s the garage, driveway or yard — like a store, with tables, racks and aisles to group similar stuff. Sort items into areas: clothing, tools, kitchenwares, electronics, knickknacks, jewelry, etc.

Post bright, colorful signs around the neighborhood, and save extra grocery bags for people’s purchases. Play some background music at your sale and greet shoppers to put them at ease while they browse.

If you plan on having more than one sale this season, you won’t have to haggle on prices much. But if your goal is to clear that crop of excess stuff (#clutter) out once and for all, allow shoppers to bargain and slash prices in the sale’s final hours.

You won’t sell everything, so contact ClothingDonations.org to schedule a pickup in the days immediately following the sale. Not only will your donation of lightly used clothing and household goods help veterans, it will reduce the temptation to take any of the excess merchandise back into your home.

Garage sale season lasts from now into fall, so get ready to get rid of the junk you don’t need. Whether you stage a single sale or decide to make garage sales a regular outlet for #decluttering, you’ll be happy how streamlined your life can become — and have a few extra bucks to spend, too!

Get Mom an Organizer for Her Favorite Things

Posted on by Jordank

While it won’t necessarily reduce the amount of stuff your Mom has on hand, a good organizer may be just what she needs to keep the household #clutter in check. There are organizing products for every area of the home, By George Organizing says, so if she has a lot of appointments, she might need a new day planner. If she has lots of shoes, jewelry, purses or clothing, there are organizers that can streamline storage. There are bathroom organizers, car organizers and kitchen organizers. And if not everything fits in the newly organized spaces, contact ClothingDonations.org for a pickup.