Unsolicited free items I have received from registered national charities:

• Christmas cards and envelopes (enough to open my own little Hallmark store)
• Address labels (enough to last me the rest of my life, I think)
• Notepads
• Pens
• Christmas CD
• Money (generally in coin form)
• Reusable shopping bags
• Calendars (and to think I used to enjoy buying those for myself)
• Gift bags
• Wrapping paper and bows
• Organic fair trade tea
• Birthday, symphathy, and “any occasion” cards and envelopes (for my expanding Hallmark store, I guess)
• Scarf
• T-shirt

And that’s just what I can remember off the top of my head. And in most cases, not even from charities I donate to.

Whatever surprise or delight I might have once felt in getting something for nothing is now lost under the sheer quantity of stuff coming in. It’s tipping toward making me feel punished rather than rewarded for donating regularly.

It must work, or they wouldn’t do it. But damn. How much more good could be done if they didn’t have to bribe people into donating?

Charities see alarming trend as donors become older, fewer