By Jan Schultz
Volunteer, St. Isidore’s Gift & Thrift
St. Isidore’s Gift & Thrift, an outreach of Catholic Social Services of Southern Nebraska, is about to celebrate its 15th year of existence. The anniversary arrives in March 2025.
Starting in a small building that formerly served as the fellowship hall of St. Patrick Church in Imperial, two and a half blocks north of its current location on main street, the store continues to thrive, serving residents of Imperial and surrounding communities with an array of household goods, furniture, clothing and more.
In order to provide more funds to aid those in need, volunteers donate their time each week, which store manager Bill Sullivan says “is absolutely indispensable.”
Sullivan noted that, in December, volunteer hours equaled his. On average, 35 volunteer hours are given each week to make the store operate efficiently during the three days each week it’s open.
“When you consider what our mission at the store does, we cannot function without them,” Sullivan said.
“From sorting clothes for recycling or for sale, pricing items and getting them to the shelves—while running the register, it’s pretty obvious we couldn’t open the door without volunteers,” he said.
While volunteers come and go—some due to schedule or job changes, moving from town or COVID—two women have volunteered since the store opened in March 2010.
One of those is Mary Deyle, who now lives in Oxford, 120 miles from Imperial. However, despite the distance, she still plans to be a weekly volunteer at St. Isidore’s in her regular time slot from 5 to 7 p.m. each Wednesday through the 2025 year, she said.
“I look forward to it each week,” she said.
Mary used the word “joyful” to express how she feels about volunteering at St. Isidore’s.
“It’s a real joy to come in and put this together for others to enjoy their shopping experience,” she said.
It makes her day when shoppers tell her that St. Isidore’s is unlike other thrift stores they’ve been to. She notes volunteers receive comments often about the quality of merchandise, how it’s displayed and the reasonable prices.
“When St. Isidore’s was going to open in Imperial in 2010, I was excited to have a thrift store here,” she noted.
Wednesday nights were the only time that would work for her to volunteer, so store hours—along with other days each week—were set for Wednesdays from 3 to 7 p.m. She notes those hours on Wednesdays capitalize on the fact they overlap with religious education classes at St. Patrick Parish, providing time for parents to shop while their children are in class.
She’s also able to work alongside some close friends—an added benefit, she said.
It’s doubtful, she added, that she would have been there since day one if not for store manager Sullivan.
“He’s the glue that keeps this store together. I’m not sure I’d still be there if Bill wasn’t,” she smiled.
“As long as he’s there along with some personal friends I get to see each week, I’ll do everything in my power to be there as well,” she said.
Mary and husband Gary were living in Imperial when the store opened 15 years ago, but a job promotion for Mary in 2019 took them 38 miles south, to Benkelman. Even then, she continued to volunteer on Wednesdays in her same time slot.
Now, with another move recently to Oxford, putting them closer to three of their four sons and families, but farther from Imperial, she still plans to keep volunteering Wednesdays through the rest of this year.
Mary and her husband have 15 grandchildren to enjoy. Mary herself comes from a family of 11 children, and she grew up working hard, she said.
“So to be able to volunteer now, and help others in need, is very heartwarming to me,” she said.
Sullivan said the volunteers at St. Isidore’s aren’t only valuable because of the hours they give at the store.
“Our volunteers at the register sometimes serve as sounding boards or simple conversationalists” with the customers, he said.
They also serve as liaisons in the community, he said, listening for those in need and getting them in touch with CSS to see if they can be of help.
We should all remember the words given to us in Matthew 25:40: “I assure you, as often as you did it for one of my least brothers, you did it for me.”
