Money is Being Made Off of Your Hand-Me-Downs

It’s never been easier on the Coast to give away your old stuff. You can drop it into a bin. It's shipped off. Someone uses it again.

It seems like there's a shiny USAgain green-and-white clothing donation box nearly everywhere you turn these days on the Coast.

In fact from Montara to Half Moon Bay, there are currently 10 USAgain bins, receiving free donations of clothing and shoes that you may think is going to charity, but USAgain makes a profit from your unwanted threads by selling to the second-hand market or to be ground up into new fibers and new products.

The company's website states that USAgain is a for-profit enterprise that collects used clothing and resells it. Currently the company has 10,000 bins in 17 states, many of them placed in cooperation with various schools, businesses and non-profits. In 2011 alone, USAgain collected 60 million pounds of clothing, shoes and other textiles. Headquartered in Chicago and operating 11 division offices, including one in the Bay Area, USAgain employs more than 220 people.

“USAgain creates green sector jobs, protects the environment, and helps improve the well-being of people in America and around the world,” said Tobin Costen, USAgain Division Manager for the San Francisco Bay Area office, which collects approximately 275,000 pounds of clothing and shoes per month, according to the company’s website.

Indeed, USAgain bills itself as a green business whose mission is “to provide consumers with a convenient and eco-friendly option to rid themselves of excess clothing, which we divert from wasting in landfills for resale here in the U.S. and abroad.”

“Our drivers empty the bins at least once a week,” said Costen. “Most of the clothes are reused secondhand, and the rest are recycled into insulation or wiping rags.” 

According to the company’s site about 70 percent to 80 percent of what USAgain collects is sold in the reused clothing market. Half of that is sold to second-hand stores. The other half is sold to wholesale companies that sell the goods domestically or internationally.

Another 15 percent to 20 percent of what USAgain collects is turned into rags or insulation material for homes and automobiles and fiber for new fabrics, and 5 percent goes into trash.

At “no cost, no work, no liability” any business can host a bin. 

According to a corporate brochure for prospective retail business property managers on the website, “The dead space in your parking lot can easily be turned into a revenue-generating opportunity … By partnering with USAgain, you can raise your company’s green profile, provide customers with a convenient and desired textile recycling service, and attract new customers to your business.”

The company also participates with charities and non-profits around the country as part of a corporate-giving program, including 540 schools nationwide and nonprofits such as Children's Miracle Network, local churches, food pantries and tree planting programs.

“Through partnership with Trees for The Future, USAgain will be funding the planting of 200,000 trees in 2013. They are also partnering with the Sierra Club in Oakland and Our City Forest in San Jose on tree planting projects,” said Julie Watt Faqir, USAgain Government Relations Specialist.

There’s also the company’s Greenraiser fundraising program, where participating schools receive quarterly fundraising checks based on pounds collected in their bin, typically two cents per each pound of textiles collected, said Faqir. 

They also receive a Certificate of Sustainability that records the number of pounds the school collected and the resulting positive environmental impact like the water saved, CO2 emissions prevented, and landfill prevented. In Northern California, the Stockton Unified School District has received $5,170 since 2010, said Faqir.

Picasso Preschool, El Granada Elementary and Cunha Intermediate are currently participating in USAgain’s Greenraiser program.

Picasso Preschool was the first place winner of USAgain’s Earth Month contest in 2012 and won $500. In 2011 Picasso won second place in USAgain’s annual America Recycles Day contest and won $300, according to Faqir.

"We've had a great experience with USAgain's school fundraiser," said Candise D'Acquisto, Director at Picasso Preschool. "People from all over the community have been able to bring clothes and shoes that they no longer need."

USAgain also works with a number of state and national organizations that “share our commitment to creating a better planet for people to live in today and for future generations,” said Faqir. “USAgain shares its research and experience to increase awareness about the benefits of re-wearing, re-using and recycling textiles. We are members of Secondary Materials and Recycled Textiles (SMART) Association, California Resource Recovery Association, The Northern California Recycling Association, U.S. Zero Waste Business Council and other state recycling associations around the country."

Still, the company has been criticized in some communities for taking donations that could have gone to charities such as Goodwill, Salvation Army, and St. Vincent de Paul and for misrepresenting themselves as a charity when in reality donations are sold for profit.

It’s also scrutinized for being linked to a controversial cult-like Danish group called Tvind, a multinational charity whose leaders have been charged with tax evasion, money laundering and embezzling, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune.

Yet USAgain makes it clear that it is a business. It even says so on the drop-off boxes: “USAgain is a for profit clothes collection company. Deposits are not tax deductible.”

"We think that being profitable is a great way to make sure an activity is sustainable and can thrive in the long term," the company, which does not disclose revenues, says on its website.

The Better Business Bureau gives an A to USAgain — citing among other factors a lack of complaints filed — but reminds potential donors that USAgain is not a charitable organization as some may believe.

That doesn’t seem to matter to some Coastsiders, who are relieved to have a place to drop unwanted goods.