Everything you need to know about donating, pickup, and how your school gets funded.
Every sellable item you donate to ParentKind gets tagged with your school's name (unless you're a pre-K family doing the Kindergarten Jump Start Program).
Fourteen days after an item sells, ten percent (and higher in the near future) of the sale price is credited to your school's PTA account. Every three months, we send your school a big fat check for the accumulated amount along with a card listing every family who made it possible.
Kids' clothes, shoes, and accessories. If your child wore it or carried it to school, it probably belongs here.
We also take a short list of higher-value gear if it's one of the brands below and in good to like-new condition:
Not sure if yours qualifies? Just mention it when you schedule your porch pickup and we'll let you know. These items are usually sold locally rather than through our online shop, but the school you designate still gets a portion of the sale.
The one thing we can't take: items subject to a safety recall, and hard safety gear we can't verify the history of—bike helmets and car seats. Toys, high chairs, cribs, baby monitors, and gear outside the list above aren't part of our program yet either.
When in doubt, toss it in the bag—or mention it at pickup if it's not something that fits in one. Anything we can't use gets dropped at a local textile recycler or community organization—it won't end up in a landfill.
Our long-term goal is to donate 25% of every sale to the donor's school of choice. Since this is a brand new company doing something we don't believe has been done before, we have to start at 10% to make sure that we are able to stay in business before we can bump up our giving to the level that we want to be at.
Our goal in year 3 is to be the biggest fundraiser for every local elementary school's PTA outside of their own internal fundraisers. As soon as we are on track to be financially solvent, we will raise our donation percentage. But we can't fund schools if we go out of business, and we're committed to this for the long haul.
Every item you donate helps fund your chosen school, no matter the brand. At the same time, we have to be honest that lower value brands often break even or cost us a little more to process than what we make off of them. But that's part of our mission, we're glad to keep them out of landfills either way.
Where we're really able to sustain the business and deliver meaningful funding to schools is through medium and higher tier brands, so if you've got nicer pieces on hand, know that they go a long way.
And honestly, every donation, whatever it is, reflects the spirit of ParentKind. Giving what you have, simply because you have it to give, is generous in itself.
PPS did close individual school foundations in 2024, but ParentKind recognizes the valuable work PTAs and PTOs are doing at our schools, stepping up to fund things like literacy support, art, and field trips that foundations previously covered. Our donations go to the PTAs and PTOs. We use the term "school funding" because PTAs are filling in a lot of the gaps that regular funding and foundation funding used to provide.
Not much prep needed! If your clothes are already reasonably clean and freshly laundered, you can just bag them up and put them on your porch as-is. No need to fold, sort by size, or remove tags.
The one thing to watch for: if you've been storing items for a while and they've picked up any mustiness or staleness, please give them a quick wash before donating. It makes a real difference in how quickly we can get them ready for their next home.
Nothing goes to landfill—that's the whole point.
Items that arrive too worn or damaged to sell get diverted straight to a textile recycler. Items that don't sell within 90 days go the same route. Either way, they stay out of the trash and get a second life as recycled material.
We love our local consignment shops. They're filling an important role, but many of them are not meeting busy parents where they're at. Most parents don't use consignment because it requires a trip to the shop, waiting for items to sell, dealing with unsold items—and consignment shops are picky about what they take. That's a lot of friction for a tired parent.
We buy everything else online now. Why should kids' clothes be different? If you want used clothes online, you're stuck with fast fashion. It's time parents had a real option: quality used clothes that are better for the environment, without the time-consuming process of going into a store on both sides of the transaction.
We pick up from your porch. You shop online. We deliver to your porch. No trips, no waiting, no rejection. And every purchase funds your kid's school—it's not just a transaction, it's a community effort. That's what makes ParentKind different.
Absolutely. We accept clothes and gear for all ages, and everything will be in our online store when we launch in the fall.
Our messaging right now leans toward elementary families—that's our pilot focus. But we're committed to building a robust selection for younger kids, and we're happy to take those donations now. Pre-K families also have a special program: your donations go into an escrow account that funds your school of choice once your child reaches kindergarten.
Nope! Anyone is welcome to participate.
To donate: The easiest option is often dropping bags off at our location in SE Portland—details on the pickup instructions page. If that's not convenient, reach out and let us know where you are. For families a few miles out, we can usually schedule a pickup once enough bags are ready to make the trip worthwhile. The further out you are, the more bags we'd need before a pickup makes sense. We'll always be upfront about what works.
To shop: Our online store is open to everyone. Porch delivery within our local area has a $35 minimum. If you're further out, we can often still deliver—we'll just need a larger order to make the trip worthwhile. Prefer to skip delivery entirely? You're always welcome to pick up your order directly from us.
We're not open for shopping just yet—but we're getting there.
Right now we're in our donation collection phase, building up the inventory that will stock our store at launch. We want to make sure we have enough to give every shopper a real selection, whatever size they're shopping for—and at our current pace we're targeting a spring 2027 launch. Every bag that gets dropped on a porch between now and then is going straight into that carefully sorted seed inventory.
Stay tuned—or sign up for email or text updates to hear the moment we open.
We're not launching until shoppers can find a real selection, not just a scattered handful of items. Kids' clothing comes in a lot of dimensions at once: size, season, category, brand, condition, and every combination needs enough options that a shopper looking for, say, girls size 7 summer shorts actually has something to choose from, not just one item.
Right now we're in donation collection mode, building that depth across every size and category before we open the doors. Spring 2027 is our target for having enough on the shelves to make shopping worthwhile.
Fill out the form below and we'll be in touch to confirm a pickup time. No need to sort or fold—just bag it up and leave it on your porch. Porch pickup is currently available within our SE Portland service area. If you're not sure whether you're in range, fill out the form and we'll let you know.
Outside our current area? Find out how to become a Neighborhood Captain →