MILTON-FREEWATER, Ore — The entire stock of the local Goodwill remained completely unchanged since yesterday despite the optimism of repeat customers, hopeful sources confirmed.
“Something new’s gotta be here. It’s a Goodwill, they’re getting new stuff constantly. I recognize all these t-shirts from yesterday, but I’m sure the employees are shimmying the new stuff into the mix with no rhyme or reason,” said thrift store enthusiast Patti Cobb-Withers. “I guess if it’s all shit I’ve seen before I could just leave it well enough alone and walk away…but I gotta check the rest of the rack. I hate to miss out on something great just because I assumed it was all exactly the same.”
Store employees bluntly confirmed the suspicions of customers.
“Oh, it’s all the exact same. Didn’t sell anything, and didn’t get any donations…it’s a mirror image of yesterday, without a doubt. I just don’t have the stomach to tell our regulars,” said Goodwill assistant manager Heather Coriander. “It would break their little hearts. So much of their reason for getting up in the morning has to do with the prospect of finding the perfect ironic local business logo t-shirt or cult movie VHS for a buck. I don’t want to kill that lust for the hunt inside them. It’s like talking to a child about the Easter Bunny; what’s wrong with letting them believe?”
When asked for comment, Goodwill CEO Steven Preston reiterated the standard company protocol.
“We here at Goodwill make it clear to employees that they are, in instances like these, supposed to make sure that they get in there and mix stuff around to at least make it look like the stock has been refreshed. It’s all there in the handbook,” said Preston. “Even our most successful locations go weeks without moving product, and it’s down to the managers to muss things up to keep thrifting addicts coming in. Not unlike when you were little and you convinced your parents you’d eaten all your green beans when really, you’d just spread them around the plate. That’s the Goodwill guiding principle at work.”
In a related story, the hardware store directly next door to the Goodwill discovered a huge donation of vintage clothing in their dumpster that they don’t know what to do with.