HOME TRUTHS, Good & Green™: Recycling Furniture

Volunteers at Help1Up's Orlando, Florida, warehouse organize donations of furnishings for distribution to needy families.

Recycling small items is getting easier throughout the country, but larger goods, such as furniture, are still being consigned to landfills and incinerators at an alarming rate.Fortunately, Help1Up, the first industry-wide charitable effort sponsored by the furniture-business community, offers a solution: The nonprofit group will distribute your tax-deductible donations of unwanted new and gently used furnishings to families in need—families who have, for example, been displaced by a natural disaster, relocated after domestic violence, or are living in poverty. Items can be dropped off at more than 50 existing locations (75 by year's end) throughout the United States. Visit Help1Up.org to locate a furniture bank in your neighborhood.

Buying new furnishings? Shop at Help1Up's retail partners, where you can make a tax-deductible donation of up to 1 percent of your total purchase to the charity.— Susan Weiman

Susan Weiman
Assistant to Editor-in-Chief, Home