“Your unwanted items may be someone else’s treasures”. Did you know that while 75% of women apparently have 14 items of clothing that never see the light of day – worth a collective €70bn – charity shops still report a lack of quality in the donations they receive! We need all of those clothes you bought on impulse and can’t return, the unwanted birthday and Christmas gift sets and the clocks, mirrors and other household items that no longer go with the décor of your home!

Benefits of Reuse, Recycle!

There are many environmental benefits of reuse, recycle. Shopping in and donating to Dundalk Simon Community Charity Shop means customers have a low carbon footprint and no further energy or resources are required to create these goods. Reusing goods such as textiles and books prevents them from being sent to landfill: instead, they can be sold on to raise money for homeless services.

Did You Know?

“In 2005 Irish charity shops ensured that more than 10,000 tons of clothes, shoes and household textiles, which would otherwise have been dumped in landfill, were either reused or recycled. This is equivalent of 1000 40-foot containers. More than 80% of the items were reused; the balance was recycled either as re-carded wool or cotton or as insulation and padding in the motor industry.”

Waste Management Hierarchy

“It takes more than 7,000 litres of water to produce a kilo of cotton! Whilst prevention and minimisation are the ideal, it is clear that given our Irish weather, we need clothes, shoes and bed linen. So what can you do?”

Everybody Wins!

Donors and supporters are able to help the people we work with everyday by donating and helping us raise money – feel good while you de-clutter your life! Dundalk Simon Community gains both stock and the chance to take our message to a new audience, while being good to the environment! Plus, you also get to shop at recession busting prices for that something different…

We are extremely grateful to all of our donors for donating to our shop. We do however have a list of the items that we can take and those we cannot.

What We Can Take

Men, women’s and children’s clothing:

• Suits, Shirts, Jackets and trousers
•  Dresses, Skirts, Blouses and tops
•  Jumpers, cardigans, and Coats
•  Jeans, shorts, leggings and tracksuits
• Unused underwear
• Nightwear, shoes and runners

Weddings:

• Wedding Dresses, Bridesmaid Dresses, Flower girl dresses/Pageboy suit
• Groomsmen suits
• Unwanted/unused wedding gifts, Wedding accessories – tiaras, veils, keepsakes
• Holiday shop
•  Sun dresses, hats and sunglasses
•  Beach bags, beach towels and sandals, Bikinis, sarongs and wraps

Accessories:

•  Handbags, Jewellery, belts, hats, scarves, gloves

Bric-a-brac:

• Crockery, pictures, ornaments, clocks, vases, frames, table wear, glasses
• Linen, Duvet covers, Pillow cases, sheets, throws, curtains
• Books, books and more books

We Will NOT Accept the Following Items

• Clothes that are in extremely bad condition (Please leave these in your local clothing bank for rag collection)
• Duvets/Blankets/Pillows/mattresses
• Cosmetics/Make-up/Body creams etc (For Health & Safety reasons)
• Second-hand baby toys (For Health & Safety reasons)
• Electrical items

In order to keep costs of disposal down, if an item is deemed unsuitable for donation, we may refuse. Please do not take offence to this. Thank you for your support.

Check your donations against the checklist before donating.

Thank You for your support!