Thrift Shop Smelled as Sweet as the Rest

No one was going to say that The Salvation Army Thrift Shop in the new Tawa Mall smelled bad—not on Manager Molly McDiarmid’s watch.

‘She washed and ironed everything that went into the shop―and it just took off,’ says Major Glenys Heese. Glenys recalls how Molly washed the clothes at home in her own washing machine and ironed them in the shop.

When Glenys and husband Terry moved to the Tawa Corps in 1982, the shop was ‘a tiny, little cupboard on the main street of Tawa’. They were looking for a new location for the shop just as the Tawa Mall was being extended, but the other mall retailers were not keen on a store that might lower the tone. There was, however, a shop just outside the mall.

‘They agreed that we could have that on condition that it was kept up to the standard of any other shop, and that it didn’t smell,’ Glenys says.

Salvation Army thrift shops and Family Stores trace their beginnings back to the jumble sales that sold used clothing and household goods to people who could not afford to buy new. The money raised supported the Army’s work in the local community.

Territorial Archivist Greg Jennings says the first Salvation Army thrift shop recorded operating in Aotearoa New Zealand was at the Addington Men’s Home in Christchurch, in 1964.

‘Several other shops soon followed in the Christchurch region, and, by 1965, the decision was made to launch official shops throughout the rest of the Territory, although there was no territorial policy or direction for setting them up,’ Greg says. ‘Most were known as “Red Shield Stores” or sometimes “Red Shield Thrift Shops” and by the mid-1970s there were upwards of 22 stores.’

During the 1980s, the local Red Shield Stores, mainly in Auckland, were served by a centralised warehouse for receiving, sorting, repairing and distributing goods for the stores. However, the distribution centres were costly. In 1994–95, the decision was made to rename them Family Stores and goods were received and processed onsite.

In 1986, Field Secretary Lt-Colonel Trevor Standen reported: ‘The genesis of all stores was a local need for finance and that original initiatives came from local corps or social institutions. It is also an evangelical opportunity, and not all the profits can be seen on the balance sheet…much more is given away to meet people’s needs.’

There was a move in the early 1990s to professionalise the Family Stores, from a volunteer to more of a retail operation. ‘The goal has always been to raise money for local mission’ says Gareth Marshall, territorial director of Family Stores.

‘I want genuine partnership with local corps. That is the reason for what we do.’