Many Gorham residents may be unfamiliar with the second Goodwill store in town, which is nothing like the traditional, smaller Goodwill store in the center of town. The second store called Goodwill Buy The Pound has been open since 2012, and is located in the Gorham Industrial Park at 34 Hutcherson Drive. It is in the same large building that contains a Goodwill recycling center, distribution center, and offices.
Goodwill Buy The Pound is a far cry from any typical retail store, even by Goodwill standards. An enormous, echoey warehouse-like room with very basic fixtures is where all the picking and selling takes place. This gives the Buy The Pound store an atmosphere somewhere between a permanent indoor flea market for society’s unwanted items mixed with some old-fashioned dump picking.
The first thing a customer notices when walking in is that most of the space is occupied by twenty very large waist-high moveable bin tables on wheels, each about a foot deep. About once an hour, a line of employees emerges from the back room, each pushing one “table” slowly and carefully in a kind of grand, choreographed circuit into the public area. The bin will remain for about an hour, before it is wheeled out again, to be replaced by yet another container with similar cargo. Every 45 minutes, before the employees switch the bins around, a loud alarm buzzer goes off. All customers have to immediately drop what they’re doing and move behind a red line while employees move the bins.
Photo credit John ErsekNumerous bins and boxes await those who are willing to invest time searching for treasure.
During the middle of a normal, busy day (weekends are the busiest) there can be as many as a hundred or more customers carefully picking through all twenty containers.
There is a huge variety of items including the sad, discarded decorations of Christmases long, long ago, electronic detritus documenting America’s love-affair with wired and wireless gadgetry going all the way back the 1970’s, and an endless supply of kitchen ware such as mugs, frying pans, utensils, and an occasional dish with a fine English china label on the back.
If one is in the mood for entertainment, it’s usually easy to find enough of an assortment of used movies on VHS tape and a smaller number on DVDs, as well as music CDs, paperback novels, and well-used children’s books. Speaking of children, many come here with their parents to find used books, used toys, used clothing, and other useful items. Buy The Pound is a place where families on an extreme budget can spend an afternoon shopping together, without spending much money.
Refurbished laptop and desktop computers, furniture, books, and appliances are on display along the walls. Certain specialized items such audio-visual equipment, cameras, and power equipment are located in a glass case next to the cashier’s station.
Most of the customers know to wear latex gloves while picking. Everything is pre-sorted in an effort to remove actual trash and hazardous items, but considering the high number of items processed on a given day, the employees can only do so much.
Some people may wonder where unsold items end up if they are never purchased by one of Buy The Pound’s bargain hunters. According to Goodwill, extensive efforts are made to ensure that very little is actually thrown in the trash. Discarded items are mainly things that should not have been donated in the first place, due to being filthy or dangerous. Goodwill has developed relationships with bulk buyers for just about every specific commodity imaginable, including stuffed animals, pots and pans, plastic DVD/CD cases, computer parts, and electrical cords. Metal, paper, and plastic material is recycled. Altogether, Goodwill-NNE calculates that their operations in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont divert about 60 million pounds of materials from the waste stream every year.
Anyone considering shopping at Goodwill Buy The Pound for the first time is advised to read the store’s official list of rules and policies, which can be found here. Yes, there’s a helpful list with such reminders as “Please do not remove any items from another shopper’s’ cart and “Destruction of property before it is purchased is not allowed.”
Shoppers will be given a verbal warning for any violations like pushing, shoving, and foul language and then asked to leave for a second offense such as causing personal injury or fighting with other customers. Some people may go to Buy The Pound to find a needle in a haystack, an unappreciated heirloom, or even a treasure, if only to the buyer. It can be said that Mainers are thrifty and appreciate finding a good bargain as well as the pursuit of one, and Goodwill Buy The Pound certainly proves that.
The store’s hours are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays.