More Charity Insanity (language)

[Jay 2K Winger]

Wow. I take it back, THIS is a lot more like the Skeevy Creep's response to the charity question. :angry:

[NightWatch]

The only time I can recall being pressured to donate to a charity. I was going through the drive thru for some fast food place and the person taking my order asked if I would donate money to such-and-such well known charity. Now, had he left it at that, I would have said "Yeah, sure, no problem!" However, he continued that sentence with, "to save kids like my little brother". I just kinda made a wtf?! face and drove off.

[One-Fang]

The best way to avoid being an SC when someone asks for a donation is to just tell them you already donated.

I find a simple "No thank you" works wonders.

Want to buy a pound of coffee for breast cancer research?

No thank you.



See? No lying about giving earlier. No story to cover. No excuse that the clerk can then counter-act with offers to leave the coffee in the chest. Simple, polite, truthful, and it works.

[Imogene]

SC: "No thanks, I don't drink coffee."

"Yet you're in a coffee shop? Care to rethink your brilliant plan?"

[Alpha Strike]

The best way to avoid being an SC when someone asks for a donation is to just tell them you already donated.

Donating to charity is a highly personal thing.

Asking once is fair game. Asking again after a polite decline, or challenging the no, is tantamount to aggressive panhandling, no matter how worthy the cause.

I think Automan Empire hit the nail on the head here: donating IS a highly personal thing. I should able to say "No, thank you" once and be left alone after that. I shouldn't have to justify my refusal, think of some white lie to give or explain that I've already donated

[Personally I'm much more willing to give to charities that understand and respect this concept; hard-sell organizations - even ones that are "good" causes - are much less likely to get my money if they keep pushing after my initial "no."]

[Becks]

"Yet you're in a coffee shop? Care to rethink your brilliant plan?"

I go downstairs to the coffee shop, but not for the coffee.

I go for the frozen hot chocolate and to check out the used books.

[Gurndigarn]

I should able to say "No, thank you" once and be left alone after that. I shouldn't have to justify my refusal

My complaint is that the Buy-N-Large chain I service machines at regularly allows various charities to panhandle in front of their entrances. So I have to turn them down, on average, once per workday if they realize that I'm the same person going in-and-out as I gather stuff, or every freaking time I need to get something else from the van if they're operating on autopilot.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

I am also one who goes to coffee shops but rarely drinks coffee. I will usually buy some hot apple cider or one of those mindpower drinks with the guarana in it or whatever and a baked good of some kind.

[Heatherina]

Okay, okay, hear me out. I would never say something that blatantly ignorant but I'd like to offer my opinion on the donations thing. It seems like every business out there goes through their own charity drive for some organization or another and they do it very often. If I had money to donate I would make a personal donation probably on the organizations web site to something I strongly believed in albeit breast cancer awareness is important--I'm just trying to make a point. I'm tired of being asked for money for dozens of worthy causes when I take my infrequent shopping trips. I know every cause is important but I honestly don't have the money to give to every organization that requires it and it doesn't help when you constantly hear some of those charities abusing the collected funds and that when you donate only a small percentage of it is gone to the actual cause of helping the people who need it. Oh anyways I digress... just because you choose not to donate doesn't make you a bad person. She however--was completely out of line, but being in retail helps you discover that people aren't as smart as you once thought they were.

[SpyOne]

I don't think todays contestant thought there was any link between coffee and cancer: she just thinks people shouldn't drink coffee. She doesn't, and she's not about to buy coffee for someone else either, even if the proceeds go to a good cause.


Frankly, I don't much like the aggressive charity drives like the one your store is having. Have a donation box, have signs pointing out that part of the purchase of X will go to charity. Our store is also raising money for Susan G. Komen for the Cure. We have a nice big display of various pink items, including pink M&M's and pink versions of our regualr coffee mugs, and part of each sale of those items goes to the charity.

Plus-selling ( or Suggestive Selling, or whatever your company calles it) is mildly offensive. It is a high pressure sales technique, and it usually comes off as being pushy. Most companies have a policy against doing it to children specificly because it is recognized as coercive behavior. Plus-selling an item where the proceeds go to charity is just upping the stakes and adding pressure. Instead of "Would you like fries with that?", it is "Would you like fries with that or would you prefer to be a horrible person?"


A LOT of people are going to react badly to you trying to blackmail them into giving to charity, even if they don't consiously realize why they are reacting that way to what you are doing. If you have to keep doing it all month, you need to get used to that.
Or find a way to make the cutomers aware of the option without seeming like you are trying to push them into making a donation. (If you do this, please let the rest of us know what it is. I've been looking for years.)

[SpyOne]

I'm tired of being asked for money for dozens of worthy causes when I take my infrequent shopping trips.

My breaking point for this was about 15 years back. I got off work, and before leaving I walked down the strip mall to the grocery store to buy a few items to eat. As I walked out, some people with a table set up just outside the door asked, "Donate to the homeless?"
I just snapped. My brain-to-mouth filter failed completely. I said, "I am the homeless," as I walked on.


It was true.
I lived in a hotel room that I shared with 2 other adults and 2 children. I slept mostly in my car (a 15 year old Toyota that cost me $300), because I was carpooling with one of my roommates and that meant I was only in the room for about 6 hours a day (Come home, watch some TV, sleep, get up and drive roommate to work, sleep in car, go to work, pick up roommate, go home). All of my money was going for food, gas, and that hotel room. And I was helping others: my contribution to that room made it possible for the other 4 people to afford it. My gas was how the one with a job got to work. And I resented being made to feel bad about not giving more.

My grandmother used to send $5 a month to Oral Roberts. She listened to his radio show, and he always asked people to send it "what they could", so she did. One day she got a letter from his organization asking if she could increase her donation. She never sent him another cent. "He got greedy," she said, and that was the end of it.

[MadMike]

My grandmother used to send $5 a month to Oral Roberts. She listened to his radio show, and he always asked people to send it "what they could", so she did. One day she got a letter from his organization asking if she could increase her donation. She never sent him another cent. "He got greedy," she said, and that was the end of it.

That sounds a lot like what my one friend experienced with PBS. Like your grandmother, she sent "what she could, when she could." One day, she got a request from them to increase her donations. She ignored it, and kept sending what she was able to, and then they started sending her a newsletter. Then when she didn't increase her donations, they started laying a guilt trip on her about what it cost to send her those newsletters she didn't ask for.

And like your grandmother, she stopped donating after that. They got greedy, and consequently stopped getting money from her.

[EmilyRose1982]

Ok, just to clarify a few things about my company's charity drive:

The company makes NO profit off the sales--all that goes to Susan G. Komen.

Coca-Cola matches our total donation, no matter the amount, so our efforts are doubled by them.

We are never pushy with people--if they say no, we just nod and say okay, and move on. It's not the end of the world.

The reason we put that donation box for purchased coffee out is because a lot of people don't have coffee makers at home, and that's only why they wouldn't buy any. When presented with this other option though, so many of those customers get excited that they can help. (since we don't take straight donations, which I think is stupid)

The reason my company is so passionate about this whole promo is one of our original roastmaster's died of breast cancer when she was only 35. She made the company what it is today, in terms of the fabulous coffee we have.


I hate charities that constantly batter me with requests for money, and hate even more those that I do donate to, and continually ask for more. I'm well aware that people come into my store that can barely afford the coffee they buy as a luxury item, so when they say no, I accept it and move on. The only time I present that donation box is when someone says they would buy coffee, but they don't have a coffee maker at home.

So stop attacking me and my company.

/end

[Mark Healey]

Offering the chest as an alternative to taking the coffee home isn't out of line. It gives a way to contribute without taking the stuff home, and since not wanting it at home was the reason given for not wanting it, it's a solution, not being aggressive. If you don't want it, just say no thanks. Don't make an excuse and then get huffy when a solution is offered for your excuse.

Actually Norm Feuti has a bit about this in his book (from some of the phrasing in his book I think he reads this site). It involves shoe trees and he has a cute little dramatization (with what is going on in the participants heads). It comes down people make excused because they don't want to be rude with a flat-out refusal. Just like you don't care why someone does or does not want a bag, you shouldn't concern yourself with why they don't want to give to your charity.

[Misanthropical]

That sounds a lot like what my one friend experienced with PBS. Like your grandmother, she sent "what she could, when she could." One day, she got a request from them to increase her donations. She ignored it, and kept sending what she was able to, and then they started sending her a newsletter. Then when she didn't increase her donations, they started laying a guilt trip on her about what it cost to send her those newsletters she didn't ask for.

And like your grandmother, she stopped donating after that. They got greedy, and consequently stopped getting money from her.

I use to send in donations to a certain company and when I couldn't afford to do it for a few months, they sent me a letter saying I was the reason they were going to go under, unless I sent them more money. I never sent them another cent.

I do try to buy things that support Susan G. Komen, though.