What a shameful waste...

[caseydog]

Seems a couple of NYC stores were caught being very, very bad.

H&M, Walmart Reportedly Destroy and Discard Unsold Clothing


Slashing prices is common around the
holidays, but slashing clothes?
The Herald Square NYC location of fast
fashion retailer H&M allegedly discards
garbage bags filled with unsold clothing
which has been destroyed with holes or
slashes on a regular basis, according to The
New York Times.

“At the back entrance on 35th Street,
awaiting trash haulers, were bags of garments
that appear to have never been worn.

And to make sure that they never would be
worn or sold, someone had slashed most of
them with box cutters or razors, a familiar
sight outside H&M’s back door,â€

[caseydog]

Original NYT Article...

A Clothing Clearance Where More Than Just the Prices Have Been Slashed

By JIM DWYER

In the bitter cold on Monday night, a man and woman picked apart a pyramid of clear trash bags, the discards of the HM clothing store that reigns in blazing plate-glass glory on 34th Street, just east of Sixth Avenue in Manhattan.

At the back entrance on 35th Street, awaiting trash haulers, were bags of garments that appear to have never been worn. And to make sure that they never would be worn or sold, someone had slashed most of them with box cutters or razors, a familiar sight outside H & M’s back door. The man and woman were there to salvage what had not been destroyed.

He worked quickly, never uttering a word. A bag was opened and eyed, and if it held something of promise, was tossed at the feet of the woman. She said her name was Pepa.

Were the clothes usually cut up before they were thrown out?

“A veces,â€

[Miriam C.]

I guess we know why lots of outlet stores went out of business......... I really hate waste!

[tonyj]

This practice is not unique to those stores only. It is practice in many business to destroy stale inventory to prevent employ theft and to prevent a "flea market" source of low cost merchandise.

I knew a woman who worked in a book store and they had an ongoing procedure to remove non-selling books from the shelves to make room for new inventory. The employees would spend a few hours ripping the front and back covers off the books to make them unsaleable, and then throw them in the trash. At the end of this shift the woman I knew would go through the books and retrieve the ones she wanted to read and carry them home. She had a voluminous library of cover-less books, and always a source of reading material. When she was finished, she would pass the books on, or throw them in the trash.

It is sad that business can't find a way to beneficially make rid of their bad inventory while helping a society of folk who wouldn't be able to purchase said inventory, or profit from its recycling. Nope, we don't want someone profiting from our expense.

[cuyeda]

Similar to TonyJ statement. I work at a name brand electronics manufacturing company. Some products are returned by dealers that is stated to be problematic, but the truth is there may be nothing wrong with it, maybe the end user changed their mind about it, maybe they just didn't read the instructions.

It cost more to staff a refurbishing department and repackaging than it is to get full tax write off on paper. I know the sledge hammer is used, so that it can never be sold again, but the company won't even give it to the employees for personal use. I avoid even looking at the products being destroyed because it upsets me to see such waste. If an employee gets caught dumpster diving, they get termintated.

I am not a tax expert, but believe companies get a better tax write off as a lost than to donate it.

[caseydog]

Similar to TonyJ statement. I work at a name brand electronics manufacturing company. Some products are returned by dealers that is stated to be problematic, but the truth is there may be nothing wrong with it, maybe the end user changed their mind about it, maybe they just didn't read the instructions.

It cost more to staff a refurbishing department and repackaging than it is to get full tax write off on paper. I know the sledge hammer is used, so that it can never be sold again, but the company won't even give it to the employees for personal use. I avoid even looking at the products being destroyed because it upsets me to see such waste. If an employee gets caught dumpster diving, they get termintated.

I am not a tax expert, but believe companies get a better tax write off as a lost than to donate it.

When I worked for EDS, I saw some guys dumping all kinds of AV equipment into a dumpster, and asked why. They said it was being replaced, and explained that the tax rules made it more financially beneficial to dump it than to donate it to schools churches and such.

Some of it ended up being donated to churches in the area that also had schools -- seems someone went dumpster diving. Oh heck, the statute of limitations is long gone -- I went dumpster diving. Some of the stuff was broken, but I got a half-dozen kodak slide projectors (this was in the early 80s) and a couple of overhead projectors.

I kept one slide projector for myself, and gave the rest to some churches in North Dallas -- anonymously.

It's a shame to think that I could have been arrested for that.

CD

[Aaron Coffee]

My colege roommate worked at Hardee's and said that at the end of the night they where not allowed to hand any leftover food to the poor people waiting outside, instead they had to throw it in the dumpster, then the poor were allowed to dig it out of the dumpster. He did say that they would lay it on top of a clean piece of cardboard or such, just to be nice.

[caseydog]

My colege roommate worked at Hardee's and said that at the end of the night they where not allowed to hand any leftover food to the poor people waiting outside, instead they had to throw it in the dumpster, then the poor were allowed to dig it out of the dumpster. He did say that they would lay it on top of a clean piece of cardboard or such, just to be nice.

I used to own a business in a shopping center anchored by a Kroger. They would give some of their out-of-date food to charity (a truck came once a week for all the out-of-date bread for that day), but most went into the dumpster. I would take my trash to the dumpsters and see the Kroger dumpster packed full of food. Mostly bread and produce.

That was twenty years ago, so I hope things have changed, but I'm not going to bet the farm on that change having happened.

CD

[Aaron Coffee]

It is somwetimes difficult to get charities to take food. I knew a guy that bought 100 happy meals at McDonalds, because that was the only way he could get all of the beanie babies they were giving as a promotion, and he couldn't get the local school or senior center or anyplace to take the sandwichs and fries.

[caseydog]

It is somwetimes difficult to get charities to take food. I knew a guy that bought 100 happy meals at McDonalds, because that was the only way he could get all of the beanie babies they were giving as a promotion, and he couldn't get the local school or senior center or anyplace to take the sandwichs and fries.

That is already cooked food, and it is about as unhealthy as food gets. And, it barely qualifies as food. I'm sure the charities just could not deal with storing McD's burgers and french fires, and actually have them be edible by the time someone ate them.

McDonald's french fries? They have a edible life span of twenty minutes - tops.

And, the only reason he was making this "generous" donation was because he bought 100 happy meals to get the beanie babies. He didn't care about the seniors, he wanted the stupid beanie babies.

Sorry, but I'm not buying this "charities won't take food" line. If he had approached them with an offer of fresh meat, bread or produce that he had no use for, they would have taken it. Even canned goods. But McDonald's burgers and fries that have been in the back seat of a car for who knows how long? Would you accept it?

CD

Edit: I didn't mean to jump on you, Aaron. I just have some personal ideas about what is and what isn't charity. Like, when a rich guy gives one of those giant checks to a charity in front of news cameras. That is NOT charity -- it's public relations. Likewise, for your friend to offer a bunch of already cooked burgers and french fries to senior centers after he bought them to get beanie babies is not charity, IMO.

Maybe there is more to the story, but the story as I read it, didn't break my heart.

I watched a guy donate a computer to the local thrift store, and when asked if it worked, he said "it needs some repairs." The thrift store said they could not repair it, an could not use it. He still wanted a receipt for his taxes. That kind of got under my skin.

CD

[rebapuck]

My neighbor bought a bag of expensive cat food that her pet refused to eat. She could not find any shelter to take it because the bag was opened. Unfortunately, we live in a society where some people will poison food just because.....who knows why.

[High Desert]

This practice just makes me sick to see, and it is prevelent as ever from what I see day to day. One of my sons worked for an office supply company, they regularly had to take a sledgehammer to "out dated" stock. Too bad they don't make the write off better for donating than destroying. It's just wrong to me to see perfectly good items of any type destroyed no matter what the product. Waste is waste not matter the reason. I've donated a lot of stuff to a local charity over the years, I never have taken the receipt they always offer.

Certain food products do have a chance of liability to the company of origin, but I've seen many cases where that was even too literally and whole truckloads of viable product were dumped. Thanks ambulance chasers

/rant

[starleen2]

One has to wonder if some of those destroyed clothing ended up being marked as a loss due to “shopliftingâ€

[TwilightLane]

[quote="starleen2"]One has to wonder if some of those destroyed clothing ended up being marked as a loss due to “shopliftingâ€