If you’re still looking for Christmas gifts, Goodwill Industries of the Valley may have the solution for you. The organization held an auction last Saturday at the Goodwill Warehouse next to the Salem store and there will be another auction this Saturday at 9am and again on the 22nd.
Jim Shaver, Vice President of Marketing & Development for Goodwill, says they had more than 50 bidders and sold four or five televisions and a lot of office furniture Saturday. “It was as good as if not better than previous auctions,” according to Shaver.
Goodwill has been holding auctions every other week since May but this is the only time they’ve had three in a row. Shaver says the same people come to the auctions. Some take the goods they buy and resell them at flea markets.
“In the summertime, we compete against yard sales, so it (revenue) is down some. . .We had the best of both worlds now. Saturday was not cold, but there were no yard sales.” The final auction will be in mid-January and Shaver says in March they’ll start a pound store.
“It’s a whole lot like an outlet store. We will sell material that did not sell in our store the first time it was in our store, by the pound as opposed to by the piece. That way it gives us a bit more in revenue than we would get if we sell it for salvage because salvage is like 25, 26 cents a pound.”
Goodwill sells items people donate and in turn use the money for employment training.
“It’s all about jobs,” says Shaver. “Goodwill Industries is an organization that trains people who face barriers to employment.” There are programs for senior citizens who need to be retrained to go back into the workforce, mentoring programs for youth, and employment programs with those who have physical or intellectual challenges.
In fact, visitors to the main office in Salem can see examples of Goodwill’s mission when they walk in the door. There are four stained glass pictures, each bearing a single word. “I said I want them called, ‘Respect’, ‘Pride’, ‘Hope’, and ‘Dignity’ – the things you have when you have a job.”
Since Goodwill moved into an already existing building several years ago, there was no typical “groundbreaking ceremony.” Instead, Kathy Sue Hudson, who owns Custom Originals in Stained Glass, cut rectangles out of stained glass. “We had folks come and visit us that day (and) write little sayings on them,” said Shaver. Mayor Bowers signed his name with “Best wishes.” “Believe in the power of work”, “Keep your head high”, “Goodwill works so others can work”, are written on some others.
Hudson and her daughter, Mariah Davis, who’s a student at James Madison University, then assembled the rectangles into picture frames, surrounded by other colorful pieces of stained glass.
Shaver believes that more people got involved than if they had just turned over shovels of dirt and the glass is something that will last for decades. People who see the artwork ask about them, “Because we really are those things on the wall right there.”
