Officials with St. Vincent de Paul in Cincinnati are “excited” to be bringing online a new Butler County thrift store and donation center. They have several locations throughout Greater Cincinnati, but the closest ones to Hamilton are in Mason and Colerain Twp. Opening a Butler County store brings a brick-and-mortar location to a community it already serves.
“We have several parishes out there that have Vincentians who are kind of our on-the-ground, in-the-community volunteers who are out there in Hamilton, and this is going to be an opportunity for those who need affordable items to be able to shop,” said Anne Jones, spokesperson for Society of St. Vincent de Paul in Cincinnati.
This also makes it more convenient for those who receive vouchers for free items at a St. Vincent de Paul center, such as for furniture, clothing and household items.
“We have a lot of neighbors who we were giving out to in the Hamilton area but they have to come further into the city in order to redeem them,” she said. “We’re hoping to help that out as well as just to continue to expand and get more donations from those areas. All of that eventually goes back to helping with our homelessness prevention, our charitable pharmacy, our food pantry, all of those services.”
Greater Hamilton Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Dan Bates said a new St. Vincent de Paul will improve the curb appeal to the site.
“St. Vincent is a well-known, well-run non-profit with many programs. Their retail stores fulfill a need, provide funding for their many programs and pricing that appeals to a broad demographic of bargain hunters,” he said. “They are known for maintaining their properties, so it should also be a plus to the neighborhood with a tenant who values curb appeal.”
The Hamilton center will be St. Vincent de Paul’s second-largest thrift store at about 2,400 square feet of retail space. It’s largest facility is at its Western Hills location on the west side of Cincinnati.
At this time, they do not have an estimate on the number of employees they’ll need, but they do need the community’s help to stock the store given the quick turnaround on the redevelopment project.
“We are certainly dependent on donations and we are able to pull donations from other stores, but we’ve got a whole new store to fill,” Jones said.
In addition to donation centers in Mason and Colerain Twp., among the numerous drop box areas across the tri-state, St. Vincent de Paul has two in Butler County: Queen of Peace Catholic Church, 2550 Millville Ave., in Hamilton, and Sacred Heart Church, 400 Nilles Road, in Fairfield.
For a complete list of thrift stores and drop box locations, visit www.svdpcincinnati.org.
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