David and Victoria Beckham donate clothes to raise money for Yolanda relief

LONDON – Hundreds of enthusiastic shoppers queued around the block to snap up bargains after Victoria and David Beckham donated a shop's worth of their clothes to help in the relief effort for Typhoon Yolanda.

The charity event, which hopes to raise £40,000 ($64,744) from the donation, filled a shop with the celebrity couple's old clothes and limited of each customer to one item.

The British Red Cross director for fundraising, Mark Astarita, explained how the Beckhams' generous donation came about.

"We've launched across the country 'Shop Drop For The Philippines'. We're asking people to donate clothing to a Red Cross shop around the country," he said. "We asked Victoria a few days ago if she would tweet about it. She loved the idea and spent a couple of days turning out her wardrobe and filled this shop with their clothing. And we're turning those clothes into cash for the Philippines."

Shoppers had queued since the early morning and demand was so high that security was forced to operate a one-in one-out door policy.

Remy Serpinet was one of those shoppers and had been sent down to the store by his girlfriend to search for a deal.

"I'm actually shopping for my girlfriend here. She just texted me, 'Go to Red Cross in Chelsea.' She says 'Apparently David and Victoria just donated some clothes.' and 'Can you have a look for me?'. And I am having a look for myself too. So, yeah it's quite a good thing from the Beckhams to have done that I think and it's quite successful apparently," he said.

Another customer, who was at the shop by chance, bought her son one of David Beckham's suit jackets.

"Well, we happened to be in London. We had no idea that this was going on. So, I bought a nice jacket for my son because he's the same size as David Beckham. I'm delighted that it's going to the Philippines as well. It's a great cause," explained Doone Muir.

It is hoped that the celebrity donation will encourage others to bag up their old clothes and hand them over in order to raise more money for the Philippines Typhoon relief effort. — Reuters