Charity Never Starts At Home For Some People

(My store is hosting a Safety Week, and throughout the store parents can pick up free flyers, stickers, magnets, and mini coloring books with child safety tips on them. Overall, it’s to raise awareness for a fundraiser we’re doing for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, where we ask for a $1 donation at the registers. A mother and her young daughter come up to my register, and I see the daughter has collected all of our free items and looks very excited.)

Me: “I like your stickers! Did you get some magnets, too?”

(I point to the pile of magnets we have at the register, and the daughter proudly holds up her own magnets. At that moment, her mother grabs another sheet of magnets and puts them in her purse.)

Customer: “For my son at home.”

Me: “Great! I’m glad you guys like those; they’re for a great cause. All right, your total is [total]. Would you like to donate a dollar to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children?

Customer: “Nope, I’m fine.”

(I looked incredulously at the excessive amount of free safety trinkets they’d collected, before continuing with the transaction as politely as I could. It was pretty baffling, though!)