In the charity business
If you get a clothes collection bag through your door from Clothes4Charity you might get the impression that it is a charity.
First, there’s the name, then there are all the references to fundraising and donations.
The bag reads: “Help raise funds for UK charities by donating your unwanted reusable clothing. “Many thanks for your support.” The reverse of the bag describes Clothes4Charity as “a fundraising scheme operated by E&C Export Ltd”. In other words, it is a for-profit private limited company, not a charity.
Its website states: “We collect your donated clothing and spread them throughout UK and the world where people are less able to afford new and shiny apparel.
“Your donated clothing starts their new life while we generate funds and spread them throughout UK.”
E&C Export is only mentioned in the terms and conditions, where it states that charities will get £300 from every tonne of clothes that are sold.
The director is 34-year-old Evaldas Cibulskis from Lithuania, who now lives in Dagenham, Essex.
He told me that his charity clothing collections had only been in operation for a month so there were no figures to show how much the company had given to good causes.
“I believe we have a very clear explanation on our bag of who we are and what we do,” he said.
“We have never referred to ourselves as a charity and have no plans to do so in the future.
“We strongly believe that £300 for charity for a tonne of clothing is a fair amount of money, in fact there are some similar schemes who only give as low as £50-100.
“And sure, as a private company we do expect to get a certain amount of profit in return.”