Jaw Dropper: Here’s How Many Pounds of Discarded Clothing Were Collected at the Philadelphia Marathon

Photo courtesy Michael Resnic/Clothes-pin

Local charity Clothes-pin was out in full force on Sunday morning, picking up the discarded clothing of some 30,000 Philadelphia Marathon runners. As we’ve written about in detail before, the group’s volunteers sweep the streets after participants leave the starting area, collect the discarded outerwear and donate it to charity.

I checked in with Clothes-pin director Michael Resnic to find out what the haul was this year. One word: impressive. Here’s the breakdown: 

410: total number of bags collected

16,400: estimated articles of clothing collected

8,000 pounds: approximate total weight, per industrial scale

In case you’re wondering, 8,000 pounds amounts to four tons of clothing. Crazy, right? This year marked Clothes-pin’s eighth Philadelphia Marathon. They had 35 volunteers who came out to help, with donations going to the Bethesda Project and Chosen 300 Shelters.

Sunday’s collection brings the grand total to 242,000 articles of clothing collected by Clothes-pin to date. “We’ll hit a quarter of a million by Broad Street,” says Resnic. Not bad at all, my friends.

Check out a video of the volunteers hard at work below. For more info about the organization, check out Clothes-pin’s Facebook page.

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