By Taylor Boyd
My Friend’s Closet, a clothing ministry of Stuart Presbyterian Church, will close on Feb. 15 and reopen on Mar. 1 with new, spring items.
Amy Smith, volunteer coordinator, said the store will sell winter apparel for mark downed prices, with coats $2 and sweaters costing $1.
Clearing out the winter inventory will allow the store “to move onto spring beginning in March,” Smith said.
All items in the store will be $1 or less on Feb. 1 and Feb. 4, with Fill-a-Bag days set for Feb. 8 and Feb. 11.
“We provide those (bags). They’re brown grocery bags and you fill it to the rim with anything in the store for $4,” she said.
“After those dates, we close to donate remaining items to another cause and reopen with new spring inventory. It won’t be new clothing, but will be new to our customers,” Smith said.
She added that the store is stocked with clothes donated by the community.
“We accept gently used and stylish clothing,” she said, adding the store accepts tops, bottoms, dresses, shoes, purses, belts, and accessories. She said donations are accepted during store hours. A drop box is not available.
“A lot of the stuff that we get we do go through and sort and either send to the Goodwill or we send it to another ministry in Africa. We just donate it elsewhere if it’s not what we expect for our store,” she said.
She said after paying the store’s rent, proceeds from sales are donated to the Patrick County Food Bank, Caring Hearts Free Clinic, Patrick County Developmental Center, the St. James Fund of Stuart Presbyterian Church, and other organizations to help the community.
While the store “did initially close for a couple of months in the beginning” of the pandemic and “some volunteers have opted not to come back due to COVID, but plan to return later,” Smith said the store has reopened and is “back to business as usual with masks.”
