Friday, April 20, 2012

What Happened Here??



In all of 2012, I have never had a $0 sales day. It is looking like I might break that streak today! I count my sales by eBay's time, so technically I still have nearly 5 1/2 hours during which I might actually sell something. Anything. Fingers crossed.

But I can't complain. I have been on a very high sales wave for the past couple months. A zero day won't kill me. It'll just kill my ego. :)

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Today marks 1 full month since my last thrift store hit. And I'm still alive. The twitching has even subsided. I think it gets easier after a certain point. You start to see progress - the unlisted pile starts to shrink. You start to feel like you're actually being productive, rather than just buying buying buying and making that pile bigger and bigger.

It helps me to announce my intentions to as many people as possible. My mom, my husband, and my kids all know that I'm on a thrifting fast. My daughter is especially ruthless. She's only 11, but boy does she give me a hard time when she sees that I'm thinking about slipping up.

It helps to be accountable to someone. It's worked so far!

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Having said that ... I guess I should clarify that I am on a THRIFTING fast. But I'm still allowed to go to yard sales :)   We were NOT going to go yard saling today, but it's supposed to be rainy tomorrow, so we ended up ditching school and going to several yard sales. I didn't find a wide variety of stuff - a few chapter books to add to my book lot collection, a few pairs of shoes (50 cents each at a church yard sale), a set of hot rollers (Clairol Kindness - one of my favorites to sell), and a mountain of kids' clothing.

I'm trying something different this year. Any yard sales where I find kids' clothing cheap enough (25c - 50c per piece) and in really nice condition, I'm going to buy up a bunch and either lot them, double the price, and put them on my local Facebook selling group, or I'll save them up for the children's consignment sale I sell at each fall and spring. I will probably try the Facebook group first. It's less profit, but it's also significantly less work and almost no storing. We'll see. If I have success on the FB group (as in - selling them quickly and at least double what I paid for them), then I'll keep it up. If my stuff just sits, or I can't get double my money, then I'll hang on to them for the consignment sale. My theory is that if it's something I can price at $3 or more, I will pay up to 50 cents for it. If I volunteer, I get 70% of my sales. So a $3 price tag would get me $2.10. If I paid 50 cents for it, and I sell a large volume in one weekend, then I think that's worth the effort.

Ask me what I think of that theory after the next consignment sale ...

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I'm off to watch tv. Will someone please come and buy a jar of shoe cream or something so I don't have to break my sales streak?? ;-)   just kidding....

3 comments:

  1. I have the same exact plans with cheap clothing at garage sales. I've been doing alot of selling on our local FB groups of my girls old clothes. Clothes that are really only worth giving away or having my own yard sale. Most of my stuff goes to one or 2 people in large batches. Little sales add up!

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  2. Holy cow! And right after you were dubbed Silver Powerseller. Strange!!

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    1. Yeah weird, huh! I did sell a skirt and a sewing pattern in the 11th hour. Whew! My streak stands :)

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