Savers
Encyclopedia
Savers, Inc. headquartered in Bellevue, Washington
, is a privately held for-profit thrift store chain offering secondhand shopping. An international company, Savers has more than 200 locations throughout the United States
, Canada
and Australia
, and receives its merchandise by paying cash to non-profit organizations for donated clothing and household items. Savers is known as Value Village in the Pacific Northwest
of the United States and most of Canada
, and Village des Valeurs in Quebec
. In Australia and other regions of the United States, the stores share the corporation's name. Main owners are Tom Ellison, son of the founder Bill Ellison, and Freeman Spogli & Co.
a private equity company (May 2009)
Items deemed resellable are displayed for purchase in stores. Savers also has a recycling program and attempts to recycle any reusable items that cannot be sold at the stores, as well as any items that do not sell over a period of time to make room for fresh merchandise. Savers has buyers for its recyclables throughout the world and attempts to keep as much donated product out of the waste stream as possible.
Lois and the family are headed to shop for clothes for the boys at Value Village.
The cover of the Die Mannequin
album Slaughter Daughter contains two porcelain cats, one of which has a price tag from Value Village on it.
A Value Village store in Coquitlam was also used in a movie titled "Kickin' It Old Skool".
Bellevue, Washington
Bellevue is a city in the Eastside region of King County, Washington, United States, across Lake Washington from Seattle. Long known as a suburb or satellite city of Seattle, it is now categorized as an edge city or a boomburb. The population was 122,363 at the 2010 census.Downtown Bellevue is...
, is a privately held for-profit thrift store chain offering secondhand shopping. An international company, Savers has more than 200 locations throughout the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
and Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, and receives its merchandise by paying cash to non-profit organizations for donated clothing and household items. Savers is known as Value Village in the Pacific Northwest
Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...
of the United States and most of Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, and Village des Valeurs in Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
. In Australia and other regions of the United States, the stores share the corporation's name. Main owners are Tom Ellison, son of the founder Bill Ellison, and Freeman Spogli & Co.
Freeman Spogli & Co.
Freeman Spogli & Co. is a private equity firm focused on leveraged buyout and recapitalization transactions involving growth companies in the retail, direct marketing, catalog and distribution sectors....
a private equity company (May 2009)
Business
Under Savers’s business model, the company partners with local non-profits by purchasing and reselling donated items. The non-profits collect and deliver donated goods to Savers, which pays them for the items at a bulk rate regardless of whether they ever make it to the sales floor. Donations are also collected at stores directly, and the company makes payments to its non-profit partners when it receives goods this way. Savers has more than 160 non-profit partners throughout the United States, Canada and Australia, which it pays more than $117 million annually.Items deemed resellable are displayed for purchase in stores. Savers also has a recycling program and attempts to recycle any reusable items that cannot be sold at the stores, as well as any items that do not sell over a period of time to make room for fresh merchandise. Savers has buyers for its recyclables throughout the world and attempts to keep as much donated product out of the waste stream as possible.
Business Operation Issues and Transparency
In the United States and Canada the business model for many non profits was that organizations would call homes for donations, and a truck would pick them up. By the early 2000's many organizations like the Association of Community Living, partnered with Value Village because they believed it was too expensive to do it themselves. Many of the deals these organizations signed provided a very small return compared to the large amounts of money Value Village/ Savers retained. According to a article that appeared in the Alberta Report in 1996 "According to the Times, for every $1.00 that went to undersigned charities from some Ellison-owned thrift stores, $2.55 went to the Ellison associates".Cultural Influence
In an episode of the sitcom series Malcolm in the MiddleMalcolm in the Middle
Malcolm in the Middle is an American television sitcom created by Linwood Boomer for the Fox Network. The series was first broadcast on January 9, 2000, and ended its six-and-a-half-year run on May 14, 2006, after seven seasons and 151 episodes...
Lois and the family are headed to shop for clothes for the boys at Value Village.
The cover of the Die Mannequin
Die Mannequin
Die Mannequin is a punk rock band from Toronto, Ontario, Canada. They are fronted by 23-year-old guitar player and singer Care Failure . They played the "Next Big Thing" Stage at Edgefest 1 in 2006, have toured across Eastern Canada several times on their own as well as opening for Buckcherry on...
album Slaughter Daughter contains two porcelain cats, one of which has a price tag from Value Village on it.
A Value Village store in Coquitlam was also used in a movie titled "Kickin' It Old Skool".