![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
feather_ghyllActually, I'm wondering whether the issue is more related to the professionalising of charity shops. I went to a Barnado's shop that's enjoyed my custom over the years over the weekend. It had just had a refit - the floor was a light pine laminate thingy, the walls a sharp white, it seemed brighter...and emptier as I looked towards the bookshelves. There used to be an overflow set of shelves, no, two (when they weren't full of videos) on the side walls, and then a set three times as wide, curling along the wall at the back of the shop, next to the hallowed staff only door. Now there is far less space for the books, and in keeping with the snazz up, they're the sort of books you're more and more likely to see at a charity shop - one of the Shopaholic sequels, a Joanne Harris or three and books that came gratis with a magazine once.
All right, so I've been racking my brains and failing to think of a Girls Own classic or genuine bargain that I've bought at that store, but I must have at some point, as I've visited there since the days when I had pocket money to spend. In its previous incarnation, it was closer in spirit to the traditional charity shop, with a little smell of damp, an old lady serving, books priced as cheaply as 20p - written in pencil on the top right corner of the first page, of course. As you pushed open the heavy door, you were aware of the possibility of finding a hardback that had been given to some girl as a Christmas present in the fifties, tales of hockey and sea voyages, coves and Coventry. Now, that sort of book doesn't fit into the glossy experience of the new and improved! bright, airy shops.
You may find such a book at an Oxfam bookshop of course, but it certainly won't be priced 20p, it'll be something closer to what it would be sold for at a second-hand bookshop. And since a friend pointed out that it is those second-hand shops that are hit by Oxfam, I've had to consider issues beyond my expectation that books in charity shops should be sold for under a fiver. I mean, giving money to Oxfam is no bad thing, but is it right that Oxfam should be encroaching on local small businesses' turf with their specialised shops? Not sure if that's so very clear-cut. And I probably should be more diligent about the way that the charities spend their money (eg. how much of a pound goes to good causes). I do tend to think first of 'possibility of a book that's new to me' and its cost over and above other matters.
Anyhow, I didn't get anything from the new Barnado's, except the material for this post :)
All right, so I've been racking my brains and failing to think of a Girls Own classic or genuine bargain that I've bought at that store, but I must have at some point, as I've visited there since the days when I had pocket money to spend. In its previous incarnation, it was closer in spirit to the traditional charity shop, with a little smell of damp, an old lady serving, books priced as cheaply as 20p - written in pencil on the top right corner of the first page, of course. As you pushed open the heavy door, you were aware of the possibility of finding a hardback that had been given to some girl as a Christmas present in the fifties, tales of hockey and sea voyages, coves and Coventry. Now, that sort of book doesn't fit into the glossy experience of the new and improved! bright, airy shops.
You may find such a book at an Oxfam bookshop of course, but it certainly won't be priced 20p, it'll be something closer to what it would be sold for at a second-hand bookshop. And since a friend pointed out that it is those second-hand shops that are hit by Oxfam, I've had to consider issues beyond my expectation that books in charity shops should be sold for under a fiver. I mean, giving money to Oxfam is no bad thing, but is it right that Oxfam should be encroaching on local small businesses' turf with their specialised shops? Not sure if that's so very clear-cut. And I probably should be more diligent about the way that the charities spend their money (eg. how much of a pound goes to good causes). I do tend to think first of 'possibility of a book that's new to me' and its cost over and above other matters.
Anyhow, I didn't get anything from the new Barnado's, except the material for this post :)
