Submitted by the Pick-up Gemach: The Pick-Up Gmach servicing Lakewood Bnei Torah and their families is still collecting EXCELLENT CONDITION children’s clothing, i.e. t-shirts, shirts, dresses, shorts, etc. for camp, current styles in sizes 0-16 girls and 0-12 boys.
We ask that you only donate items you’d give to a friend because that’s where it goes; Lakewood families of Bnei Torah. We were started out of need for stylish, good-condition children’s clothing, for families of Lakewood Bnei Torah who would appreciate used clothing if it is stylish and current. We have those specifications so the clothing can hold up another time around and the families can feel comfortable wearing the clothing.
All the work is done by volunteers so we don’t have to charge the recipients for used clothing. But since we’re staffed by volunteers, we ask that you just give us clothing that suites those qualifications (kids clothing, excellent condition, current styles-not out of date-and in the sizes we need) since it really, really overburdens the volunteers to pick up bags and bags of mostly unusable clothing. If you have mostly unusable clothing (pilled, torn, old, outdated, stained, went through many children…), Big Brothers Big Sisters does home pickups. It wouldn’t be fair to give to Serendipity either since they charge and no one is looking to buy that stuff.
If you want to donate something we don’t list as one of the items we take, you can text us to ask us if we will take it.
How Do You Donate? 3 EASY STEPS!
1) Put the current, lightly used children’s clothing into a bag, tightly sealed to protect from rain
2) Label it “gmach”
3) Set it out and THEN text us at 848-525-6961, with your address, and/or instructions on where we can find the clothing (i.e. basement, porch etc.)
It will be picked up by a volunteer within 24 hours from when we are notified that it is out.
Please leave it out until it is picked up!
-The Pickup Gmach
Please note:
We are sorry but we are at our limit for the amount of families we service, as we are a small-scale gmach run by volunteers out of a basement location. Please do not contact us to join at this time.
We give our extra clothing that is stylish, current and in good condition to Serendipity so more people can benefit from our items as well. We suggest you try Serendipity if you are in need of clothing.
Does anyone have contact information for the organization that takes unusable clothing?
Big Brothers Big Sisters
877 336 8828
tax deductible
not missonary
I don’t understand the point of a limited Gemach. Let these selected Bnei Torah get their clothes from Serendipity, just like the rest of Lakewood who also want nice affordable clothing. This way everyone gets a fair chance at having nice “stylish” clothing.
Have you gone to Serendipity?
Have you seen what they have? This gmach is more selective and throws out all the junk/gives to non-Jewish orgs, and passes on the nice, excellent condition clothing to the families and the extras, passes on to Serendipity.
In fact, Serendpity benefits since they only get excellent condition, pre-sorted clothing from this gemach.
The pickup gmach also helps spread the word that gmachim here don’t want shmattas. Neither Serendipity or the pick-up gmach accept them. You ought to give them to poor people in Africa. People think that Serendipity wants all the old items in your attic. We tell them it’s not so. A normal, self-respecting person doesn’t want to BUY old shmattahs.
It is the people’s choice who they want to donate to.
The gmach also refers people who want to donate things that we don’t accept to Serendipity such as ONLY excellent condition items which are men’s/women’s since this gmach takes only children’s.
Also, some people are hesitant to leave their nice clothing outside in bins. They spent money on it and want it to stay nice. They also want to know that people will appreciate it.Perhaps they don’t feel like paying for pick-up or hauling to Serendipity.
The pick-up gmach is a win-win.
A volunteer
I have seen your advertisements on multiple occasions but you never tell us who you are. That is very unusual for a chesed organization. I am told that there are several groups that charade as organizations and are actually doing it to sell the clothing and turn a profit. It would be great if you would identify yourself and provide rabbinical approbation.
We are the Pick up gmach.
We were started since we believe no one should pay money for old clothing, no matter how new it looks.
We are run by volunteer.
We send the junk, the pants no one should ever donate with holes, pilled, out of style things to Big Brothers Big Sisters since they don’t specify what type and what condition clothing they take. They have free pickups and since we don’t charge the families, we appreciate their free service.
We give our extra, excellent condition clothing to Serendipity so more people can benefit than we can accommodate, already pre-sorted.
We refer people that have excellent condition clothing that we don’t accept (such as ladies, mens, etc.) to Serendipity as long as it is in good condition, and we explain to them that that’s the only type of clothing they take. (we try to help them spread the word as well).
We are a closed gmach since we took in as many families as we knew our basement location could accommodate. We took families that we personally knew so we didn’t have to worry about unhealthy people hoarding (a common issue with free gmachim). We also have a limited amount of clothing and volunteers, so that’s why we cannot accommodate the entire Lakewood community. The head doesn’t want to advertise a name with the gmach since her phone would be ringing off the hook.Already the amount of families that we were able to accommodate are being helped and that’s the extent of our abilities right now.
We’ve gotten requests in the past for more info from interested people and bored people. We’re happy to delineate it here as you can see. If you are curious, this should satisfy your curiosity. If you are bored and looking to hock, no amount of information will be enough for you.