Caring Clothes Closet founder Sara Fender (Photo by Jay Paul)
Here’s your “Project Runway” challenge: You have 150,000 pieces of clothing and one smallish shed. Can you create an upscale shopping experience for clients in need?
As Tim Gunn would say, “Make it work.”
That’s exactly what founder Sara Fender and an army of volunteers do every day with the Caring Clothes Closet, a nonprofit that gives high-quality clothing — and dignity — to people in crisis.
A modest outbuilding provided by Shady Grove United Methodist Church in Short Pump is the primary home for the clothes closet. Inside, it feels like a friendly neighborhood consignment store, just compressed. There’s a changing area, neatly labeled bins and handwritten size guides. Clothes hang on rolling racks, so they can be pulled out for a shopper to access and then pushed back against the wall.
The closet only accepts consignment-quality clothing without stains, fading, rips or pilling. Fender asks donors to consider the question, “Is it something your family would wear?”
The clothes closet aims to help people in two categories: those in a short-term crisis or an extended at-risk situation. Clients include children who have been pulled from their homes to enter foster care, adults and families who are experiencing homelessness, women and children fleeing domestic violence, and families displaced by a fire or other disaster.
Recently the closet helped a group of 10 siblings who had lost all their possessions because of a bedbug infestation. The whole family was clothed within 24 hours. Another time, a teenage boy asked for help choosing a dress for prom, because he was colorblind.
Clients make an hourlong appointment for a scheduled shopping day. They receive personalized help and one shopping bag of clothes for each member of their household, plus outerwear. No one is turned away. Whatever a client’s needs or circumstances, Fender says, “we don’t judge. We wait on you with grace and love.”
Clothes can represent a significant expense for low-income families. Fender estimates that an average bag of clothing costs $75 at thrift-store prices, equating to around $1,800 per year for a family of four.
For many clients, she explains, the clothes closet may be their first point of contact in crisis. The nonprofit can’t be all things to all people, Fender says, but no one is turned away. “If you tell us you need us, we’re there for you.”
The idea was sparked in 2006, when Fender and her husband went to Texas to meet the mother of the son they planned to adopt at birth. The mother had two daughters, aged 2 and 16, and Fender noticed that they lacked basic essentials. The younger girl didn’t even own shoes.
When Sam, their son, was born, Fender returned and took both daughters shopping. She remembers the little girl’s delight as she ran around in her new shoes, “and that just really stuck with me,” Fender says.
Two years later, Fender was volunteering at United Methodist Family Services’ Charterhouse School for at-risk children. As she began collecting clothes for those children, people began giving her more, until her garage was filled. Other local nonprofits heard about her efforts and asked her if she could provide some outfits for their clients, too.
Simultaneously, Fender was making plans to open a fitness apparel and gift boutique in a local gym. She had always loved retail; for years, she’d worked as a buyer for Thalhimers and a store manager for Express. She’d purchased the fixtures and merchandise, and then the owner told her the gym was closing.
Photo by Jay Paul
Just as the proverb promises, another door swung open. The same week, Shady Grove offered Fender a spare storage shed. All the racks and fixtures went from the gym to the shed, and two weeks later the Caring Clothes Closet was open.
It was the middle of winter, and the shed had only a plug-in heater. Still, clients showed up. A mother came with her newborn to shop for baby clothes. A group of homeless women from CARITAS were able, for the first time, to choose what they liked instead of just accepting what was handed to them. A little boy was so delighted to find Lightning McQueen slippers and pajamas that he wore them to school the next day.
“I cried all the way home, because I knew I was where God wanted me to be,” Fender says, “and that was what I needed to do.”
Now, some 70 volunteers run the operation, along with a six-person management team and a board of nine. The closet directly serves around a thousand people per year and is growing fast. The nonprofit recently decided to open an additional, larger location at Atlee Church's North Side campus on Moss Side Avenue. It will be called Fitzy's Closet at the Caring Clothes Closet in honor of Charles Fitzgerald, who has managed a smaller closet on site for years.
The Caring Clothes Closet also is adding a mentoring program for clients. The idea, Fender explains, is that clients who come for clothes could, once their lives stabilize, coach other clients and receive retail training in the store. Another goal is a mobile closet — the COW, or Clothes on Wheels — that could bring the shopping experience to underserved communities.
Photo by Jay Paul
The closet also provides clothing to about 40 other organizations. Fancy dresses go to Cinderella Dreams. Professional clothing goes to Dress for Success, the CARITAS Works program and similar organizations. Extra winter coats are sent to Puritan Cleaners’ Coats for Kids program.
Outreach Manager Judy Lewis “almost singlehandedly” brought 45,000 items to the various partners last year, Fender says. Lewis, a retired principal and special education teacher from Louisa County, drives all over the metro area delivering clothes.
Lewis remembers one couple in their 70s who lost everything when their apartment was found to have black mold. She brought them some hand-picked outfits and drove away; 10 minutes later, the couple called to tell her she’d left a bag of baby clothes by mistake.
When Lewis returned, “the woman met me in the street, just dancing.” She had already put on one of the outfits from the closet, and “she thought she was some kind of dressed up. She really looked cute.”
To learn more about how to help the Caring Clothes Closet and donate high-quality clothing, visit caringclothescloset.org.
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