Retailers can learn from consumers

This time of year, the holiday season, has been built on a foundation of generosity. It is difficult to get through a day without being reminded that giving is better than receiving, and few sentiments, by our estimation, are more accurate.

Throughout the Creative Corridor residents drop coins in red kettles, haul pet food to local shelters, post usable items on freecycle and donate all matter of used goods to various charities. And, throughout the nation, businesses have launched and thrived within the recycling movement, many taking donated items unusable by local charities and breaking them down further.

Old clothing has been cut into janitorial rags or woven into rugs. Broken furniture and household fixtures have been given new life as wall art, imaginative household pieces or garden novelties. Broken dishes have been morphed into mosaics.

All in all, an estimated 4 billion pounds of textiles are recycled annually in the U.S., diverted from landfills and spurring local economies.

Just this week in Iowa City, local leaders were recognized by the EPA for their work to reduce the estimated 25 percent of purchased food - about $165 billion annually - that is thrown out as trash, some of it still fit for human consumption. Organizations like Table to Table and Food Too Good To Waste are working with consumers and businesses to not only prevent food waste, but to be more efficient with the water and energy needed to produce, harvest and distribute those foods.

In light of all of this, it is difficult to rationalize the decision by one area retailer to fire an employee who had been donating items intended for the trash pile to a local charity.

When originally told some items were not appropriate for donations, the employee requested copies of specific company policies to better follow the rules. None, it seems, were provided and the continued donations led to the employee's termination.

While the ongoing legal debates over unemployment compensation will be decided off these pages, we do hope the incident will spur area retailers to develop and openly discuss their charitable giving as it relates to unsold items. Perceived liabilities can only be addressed once they are known.

Firing employees for violating unclear or inconsistent company policies is wrong. Sending usable goods to landfills is wrong.

It's time to find a more sustainable middle ground.

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