The Salvation Army Family Store & Donation Center — Attraction in Shelby Charter Township

I shop your Auburn Plaza Store (Rochester) and the Shelby Township Store Daily. As my name implies I sell on eBay and have for 2 decades. Right now it is 8 a.m. on a Friday and I am getting ready to attend 5/$5. As resellers we have no choice but to comb through your stores frequently and many fellow sellers like myself have stopped within the last two years. What I can’t believe is the disappearance of the merchandise we seek from the stores and attempting to convert the stores into “boutiques”. I will mention some merchandise we no longer see: vintage coach, barbie houses, pyrex priced reasonably. Another thing to note is the reviews on your “online” eBay store. I just want to say if our mom and pop eBay business had those reviews eBay would shut us down. We are your daily thrifters don’t turn your back on the ones who sustain you when everyone else isn’t spending money. As far as the Shelby store the struggle is real in there. There have been good managers (the one that left the store about 2-3 months ago made it worse instead of better) but overall lacking consistently good management. Long term customers see what’s happening. Customers like me who know the staff are treated well but there is an overall lack of appreciation for those shopping. Pricing is OVERALL too high. I don’t think you should deny it any name brand clothing has been marked up in all your stores with $9.99 being the average price for workout shorts. We are going to start buying pallets of return clothing if you don’t come back to Earth on prices - and then our business will no longer be sourcing from you. You should do some soul searching as a business entity and you should ask yourself do you really want to alienate people who resell this type of...

For health and sanitation. I used the restroom, and began to wash my hands. I had wrist and elbow surgery 8 days prior, and still have stitches even though the incision site is healing and scabbed over. Per post-surgical instructions, I brought the water up to my elbow, as I am supposed to gently wash both incisions every time I wash my hands.

I INSTANTLY knew I made a mistake when the SMELL of the water hit me. Water that smells that bad is unsafe and unsanitary for human use, and indicates an unsafe level of bacterial growth. I turned off the water immediately and patted myself dry with the paper towels in an attempt to limit exposure.

I still got an infection from the contaminated water.

The next day, both of my incision sites were inflamed with redness and swelling, as well as very warm to the touch. I am not an immune compromised person.

This is not just conjecture, I have been trained in and certified on the job, specifically for identification and correction of unsanitary and unsafe conditions. This is a serious issue, and if uncorrected WILL lead to a citation as it is a violation of consumer and employee safety standards.

Use of the sink needs to be restricted and have a posted warning to prevent use. An alternative means of hand sanitation must be provided. The quality of all water sources in the building that are intended for human use need to be tested.

Please enact these safety guidelines without delay to prevent further risk and damage to both consumer and employee health and safety. I will also be reporting this to external regulatory agencies to ensure compliance and minimize risk to the community.

Thank you for your prompt response and cooperation in this matter.

Katherine...

I shop at a number of thrift stores, multiple Sal Army included. This particular one has been consistantly over-pricing their non-clothing goods for a long time now. I'm not sure why, because their clothing prices track with other locations pricing?

The hard goods I would describe as heavily used and/or dingy products, at "like-new" pricing.

As for the clothes, standard Sal Army prices (lots of tanks/undershirts around 2.99, shirts ranging from 2.99 to 8.99, with some outliers above and below) and lots to choose from. Staff are doing their best while clearly being very short-handed, so while there can be a bit of a wait for checkout ect., it's nothing against them.

Only other complaint would be that there are only 2 fitting rooms, so there can be a very long wait for that, depending entirely on how considerate the other customers choose to be. (Also, standing in place for a long time can cause pain for people with back/knee/other issues, so a few chairs to wait in line by the fitting rooms would...