Sacred Heart Thrift Store, a variety shop, sits in downtown Atchison. Racks of used clothes, toys, furniture pieces and more fill the store waiting to find a new home, but behind this business are volunteers who have an even bigger mission in mind.
The items in the variety store are affordable, making it easy for Benedictine college students and people in the greater Atchison community to shop locally and for less.
“All of the proceeds (from the store) go to the Catholic schools (in town),” long-time volunteer Norine Wilderson said.
Sacred Heart is run by volunteers like Wilderson who care about the mission of supporting Catholic schools and want to dedicate their time towards it.
Item donations are also crucial to supporting the business. Manager Susan Page detailed how the donation process works.
“If you want to donate, you bring them down to our loading dock and put them in the doors,” Page said. “Our loading dock is open Tuesday through Sunday 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.”
Benedictine College has become involved by supporting Sacred Heart in innovative ways.
“We have a BC class that comes down here and volunteers supporting their class curriculum. They are an entrepreneur class and are trying to learn business,” Page said.
Summers are the busiest time for Sacred Heart.
“There’s times like in the summertime it’s really busy because people do garage sales and then bring what they don’t sell,” Wilderson said.
Any overflow of items that Sacred Heart does not want to keep still turns into dollars for the Catholic schools.
“We give to Big Brothers. It’s an organization in Kansas City. They pay so much a pound each and so that money goes to the schools too,” Wilderson said.
The volunteers in Sacred Heart fully support the cause and also love the art of thrifting themselves.
“I spend all I have on thrifting! I mean, you’ll be going through stuff and you’ll go “huh!”” Wilderson said.
