Sports equipment splits into three donations that behave nothing alike. Youth gear, a bat, a glove, a pair of cleats, has dedicated charities that want it. Golf clubs have their own network built around junior programs. Exercise machines have almost no takers, and most people find that out with a treadmill already in the truck. This page handles each in turn.
Leveling the Playing Field collects used sports equipment and redistributes it to youth programs so that cost does not keep children off a team. It accepts new and gently used gear across football, basketball, soccer, baseball and softball, hockey, lacrosse, golf, field hockey, racquet sports, volleyball, and playground and fitness items, and asks donors to use their best judgment on condition. It does not accept bicycles, bicycle helmets, clothing, exercise machines, fishing gear, skis and snowboards, trophies, or used running shoes.
Drop-offs are taken Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern, at its warehouses in Baltimore, Silver Spring, Maryland, Sharon Hill outside Philadelphia, Detroit, and Buffalo. For large items such as basketball hoops it has partnered with ReSupply for pickup and delivery to the local warehouse. Tax receipts are available on request.
Golf has the most developed donation path of any sport. First Tee chapters teach the game and life skills to children and take clubs and equipment; some chapters accept gear directly at their courses, First Tee Greater Philadelphia at two city golf clubs among them, while the national organization has partnered with Next Round to turn donated clubs into cash, with the full assessed value going to First Tee and no fees taken. Tee It Up for the Troops and the LPGA Foundation run similar programs through 2nd Swing, which assesses the clubs and donates the value; the LPGA arrangement includes complimentary shipping. Youth on Course converts equipment donations to cash for its junior golf access program.
The practical effect is that a set of clubs can be donated from anywhere in the country by mail, and a program receives money rather than having to store and match equipment. For a local chapter that takes clubs directly, call first and ask which it prefers.
Pitch In For Baseball & Softball provides new and gently used baseball and softball equipment to children in the United States and abroad who want to play but lack gear. Gloves, bats, helmets, catcher's equipment, and cleats are its core needs. Its site covers current drop-off and shipping options. Major league community programs run periodic equipment drives on the same model, and a local Little League usually knows where the nearest collection is.
The nearest destination is often the most useful: a school athletic department, a parks and recreation program, a Boys and Girls Club, a YMCA, or the youth league itself. Coaches keep loaner gear for players whose families cannot buy it, and a call to the athletic director or league equipment manager places a bag of gear within the season. These programs also take the items national charities exclude, such as clothing and running shoes in good condition, at their own discretion.
Treadmills, ellipticals, and rowing machines are the hardest item in this category, and most national charities exclude them outright, Leveling the Playing Field included. The realistic options: a Habitat for Humanity ReStore, many of which take working exercise equipment and offer pickup for large items, though each ReStore is run by an independent affiliate that sets its own list; Goodwill and the Salvation Army at some locations, for machines in working order, with acceptance varying store by store; and community centers, fire stations, and senior residences, which sometimes want a machine for a shared room. Free weights, benches, kettlebells, and resistance bands are a different story and are welcome almost everywhere. Call before you move anything heavy; the answer is often no, and the machine is easier to sell locally than to donate.
Goodwill and the Salvation Army take most sports gear and sell it. Play It Again Sports and similar resale chains buy or consign used equipment, including exercise machines, which is worth knowing when donation fails. Helmets are the one item to think twice about: Leveling the Playing Field accepts sports helmets, but bicycle helmets are excluded there and declined by most programs because impact damage is invisible.
Last updated September 2026. Errors: [email protected]
A treadmill is heavy, breaks in ways that are expensive to fix, and has almost no resale value against the cost of moving it. A charity that accepts one takes on transport, storage, testing, and disposal if it fails, for a sale price that rarely covers the first of those. Youth sports gear is the opposite: light, cheap to ship, and in demand at every program. The difference in who accepts what follows the economics exactly, and no amount of good condition changes the math for a machine.
Golf clubs have an active secondhand market with established valuation, which let junior golf programs partner with trade-in companies and receive money instead of equipment. The model removes storage and matching from the charity entirely and lets a donor in any state participate by mail. Other sports lack a national resale infrastructure of that kind, which is why they still run on warehouses and local drop-offs.