Sunday, June 19, 2011

The Week in Review: The Great Garage Sale Wrap-Up


Garage Sale Day 1

After all of the cleaning, sorting and organizing the unwanted items to sell, the big day finally came and went. We set up at 7am sharp, hoping to catch the early Saturday shoppers.

In the beginning I was especially worried. We live on Greenacres. And while it may be known as “the place to be,” it’s not the easiest place to have a successful garage sale. Our street is a small residential area all of one block—one block that doesn’t have a lot of drive-thru traffic. I worked as much online promoting through Craig’s List, Gsalr.com, Facebook and here on the blog before it bordered on spam. Locally we hung signs and fliers and just hoped for the best.

While I was initially worried that a lot of our bigger ticket items: the bikes, the fake fire place, the guitar, etc, wouldn’t sell, I was relieved to find we just had a slow start. Serious buyers didn’t start stopping by until after 11.

Sadly, I didn’t sell as many toys as I was hoping. Then again…look at them all.


Garage Sale Day 3
I'm trying to keep my beloved Rainbow Brite collection to a minimum.

Garage Sale Day 2
Board games, Lord of the Rings, a Chucky doll. The wares were pretty eclectic.

We had even more in storage bins that people could dig through. But a lot of shoppers stopping by didn’t bring kids with them. And as many garage sale/flea market vendors know, kids are sometimes the best customers. They come up to their parents with arms full of dolls and stuffed animals. And the parents, being it’s so cheap to satisfy children with secondhand means, usually oblige. But not today.

I am happy to say that my sister and I made a little over $200 combined and my best friend, Liz, was able to raise over $70 in cupcake sales and donations to support her nonprofit employer in a team race for the Dragon Boat Festival this fall.

In the end it was worth it, especially given my money shortage from being on temporary sick leave. I only wish I could say that the work is over. Since a lot of the stuffed animals and games didn’t sell and the goal is minimize the clutter, I have to get someone to take me to Goodwill to make a hefty toy donation.

Some of those toys I will be trying to sell in other venues. You can expect a few of those Rainbow Brite dolls in my Etsy shop sometime next week, should there be any interested collectors out there.

Speaking of collectors, I was missing out on a big market yesterday. Where are all of the hipsters? In downtown Philly you can’t spit without hitting your average hipster on his secondhand sweater. I guess the Far Northeast isn’t exactly hipster territory, as no one even asked a price on my typewriter and turntable.

So I still have a bit of work to do when it comes to orgnanizing and re-selling. But all-in-all, the garage sale was a success. I just hope Goodwill will have the space for all of the donated toys and games coming their way!


How was your week of thrifting?

2 comments:

Amber Von Felts said...

Congrats on your sale! Is there a flea market in the neighborhood that you could rent a booth at? I'd recommend doing that with your more collectible items. Maybe that's where your hipsters are? Either that or sleeping off the previous night's party!

Jackie Jardine said...

I don't think there are any indoor flea markets where I could rent a booth from. It's a shame too, because I think you're right about it being a better venue for collectible items. There are outdoor flea markets where I count rent a table, but my collectibles never seemed to move there either. Hmm. I'm going to explore my options.