The Shops: Charity

The saying is that Charity begins at home and at local charity shops, it does. For this post, I am not talking about the multi-venue stores like Goodwill or Value Village, but smaller one-off shops run by churches, hospitals, and other charitable causes. Many of these shops have goods donated by members of the organization and are run almost exclusively by volunteers.

Today, I stopped in at the Carry On Shop, a project of the Johns Hopkins Women’s Committee. The shop is run by John and Kelly who are paid staff, and is located at the Hospital’s East Baltimore Campus. When you look through the names of the Women’s Committee, they are a pretty impressive group and have some friends with great taste and deep pockets.

That’s why you can go in and find something like this:

Judith Leiber bag

New Kate Spade Evening Sandals

Gucci Loafers

One of many many pairs of Ferragamo Shoes

In addition, they have original prints and artwork, furniture, china and crystal, as well as books. You can see more images on this post from 2009.

Around Baltimore, some places which have shops are Good Samaritan Hospital, St. Paul’s Church in Ellicott CIty, Sheppard Pratt Hospital, and The Surprise Shop at the Trinity Church in Towson. Of course, there are a lot of smaller ones that I don’t know about. Many of them are only open a few days or hours a week, so you should call and check before you go.

These shops do good for the charities they benefit and for the people who buy from them, even if one of those people is me!