10 Tips For A Successful Yard Sale

May 2, 2013 at 7:55 AM (Antiques, art, bargains, Decluttering, Estate Sales, Garage Sales, Goodwill, Tag Sales, Thrifting, Uncategorized, Yard sales)
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

musical notesIt’s the most wonderful time of the year ... Yard Sale Season!

If you’ve been following this blog for any time at all, you know that between the months of March and November of 2012 my weekly yard sale adventures were chronicled herein as the “Yard Sale Documentation Project.”

That was 33 weeks of very early mornings, many amazing bargains, a few price delusions, some tepid lemonade, and a lot of laughter. There will likely be the occasional blog installment when an amazing deal is scored this season, but a regular accounting during the 2013 season is not to be.

HOWEVER, I’m going to pass along some time-tested tips so that if you are inclined to embark on hosting a sale of your own, you will have some prime information to get you started.

Yes, one friend did say he’d rather have birds peck out his eyeballs than host a yard sale. And sorry to say, I’m not going to come over and help you clean out … unless you hire me as She’s NEAT, then I’m all yours!

Nonetheless, having a sale is a great way to clean out your house, get rid of some “old baggage,” and bring in a little tax-free cash in the Yard Sale Documentation Projectprocess.

Here you go — 10 Tips For A Successful Yard Sale

1. Plan ahead. Give yourself several weeks to clean out, gather your items and other material you’ll need (such as display tables and signage), and then organize and price your goods. Yes, things should be priced. Customers get nervous when it comes to asking about prices; let customers know the ballpark they’re playing in and then get ready to haggle.

2. Watch the weather report. Catch the 10-day forecast for your area and wait for the best weather on any given Saturday.  Saturday is still the preferred day for die-hard yard salers … and the earlier start in the day the better! A 7:00am start time is not unheard of.

3.  Be aware of other events going on that day. Is your home right down the street from an annual open-air art festival, church fair, parade, or other community event? If so, that’s a great day for a sale….. customers are already in your neighborhood! On the other hand, if you know that everyone heads out of town on July 4th weekend  … you should too.

Yard Sale Documentation Project 4. Advertise – Use the newspaper, and Craig’s list too, which has become an important resource for any yard sale event. Yard Sale pros check these listings out in the days prior to any given weekend. Also, don’t forget to work your own contacts: your email lists of friends and family, your social networks, and don’t be afraid to use work/school/local business bulletin boards.

5. Good signage on the day of the sale is a MUST. Even if people have seen your ad on Craig’s list or the newspaper, they can’t buy your stuff if they can’t find you. Put your signs up the night before if possible, and remember to get that permit from the city if your town requires it.  Large bright signs complete with arrows and street address will steer even those customers who had no intention of stopping by your sale right into your driveway.

6. Enlist your neighbors. Nothing says “STOP HERE” like a neighborhood full of yard sales. Even if you can rally a couple of dsc00256homes in your area to host sales on the same day, everyone will fare much better than going solo.

7. Be on time and ready to go. If your sale is scheduled to begin at 8:00, be ready by 7:45. Don’t get caught pulling stuff out of the basement while your sale is supposed to be happening. Nothing deters potential buyers from purchasing Grannies afghan quicker than having it sitting up on the deck under a pile of newspapers.

8. Suggest uses for some items at your sale. Sometimes customers just need a reason to buy something! For instance, place a sign on a used TV– “perfect for kitchen or student room” … or alongside a camera: “Give this to gramma for her weekend visits” … “Once-worn prom dress: Great for kid’s dress up.”

9. Price your items reasonably. Price items at what people will likely pay for them, not for what you think they’re worth. “Yard Sale dollars” are a different currency than “US dollars.” I like to work on the 10% rule: If something is $50 new, I’ll spend around $5 for it at a yard sale. Also, don’t sell anything you really don’t want to sell; nobody will feel good about that transaction. Those are “emotional dollars” and that’s slippery business.

10. Create a happy atmosphere and have fun! People will be glad to spend their money when they feel good about where they are. Light music, some cookies, a box of free give-aways … these things make customers feel welcome and more willing to like you and your stuff!

Jeanne Fiorini TarotWorks http://www.tarotworks.com

Jeanne Fiorini will not require a 10% cut of your yard sale proceeds for helping you have the best yard sale ever!  But you can visit the TarotWorks website and/or the She’s NEAT site, that’d be fine.

1 Comment

Yard Sale Documentation Project: 11-10- 2012

November 11, 2012 at 9:59 AM (Antiques, art, bargains, books, Estate Sales, Garage Sales, Gardening, humor, Tag Sales, Thrifting, Uncategorized, Yard sales)
Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Let’s see, where did we leave off?

October 20th

Rained out. Just as well, I was feeling uninspired i.e. lazy.

October 27th

We’re at the point in the season where the “just wander around and look for signs” approach is no longer effective. This is now a targeted effort. And while the number of sales in the classifieds for this Saturday is down to a mere 22, there are some tempting listings.

Although there was quite a bit of stuff out there today, I didn’t come home with much, and for two very good reasons:

1.  The “I really don’t need that even though it’s totally cute” mantra that still is cycling through my head.
2.  Severe price delusions by young’un’s who think granny’s stuff is valuable just because it’s old. They’ll get the message when the end of the day comes and they’re faced with a mountain of old pine and rusty tools and outdated junk.

But I did score a new stick vac (I don’t need a sincere vacuum since I only have throw rugs at my house) and a set of “Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf” finger puppets for little Ms. Vera.

Total outlay: $6, plus I was home in time to ready the house for hurricane Sandy who is supposed to show up on Monday. We had an earthquake here in Maine a few weeks ago; what gives, Mother Nature?


November 3rd
I worked this day, co-facilitating a Jung and Tarot workshop. A great group of inspiring and enthusiastic participants made it so that I only thought a couple of times about what I might be missing in YardSale Land on this sunny Saturday.

November 10th

The Portland Press Herald’s classified section declared on Friday that the yard sale season has ended.

I beg to differ. Despite clumps of snow and chilly temps, people were selling and people were buying on this second weekend in November. And, by some sort of fortuitous yard sale telepathy, several decent sales were clustered around a well-to-do area in neighboring Scarborough.

This “well-to-do” aspect can work in your favor and sometimes it bites you in the butt. Sometimes it means there’s high quality bargains in them thar hills; sometimes it’s a pre-cognition of the relativity of money and that the realization that the word “bargain” means different things to different people.

Kate and I operate under “the 10% rule.” If the yard sale price is 10% (or less) of what the item would cost new, a purchase is worth considering. Much more over that constitutes price delusion and we’re apt to be headed toward the car mumbling and grumbling.

It was amusing to me, but not surprising, to see again those same young’un’s referred to on October 27th, still tied to their imagined value of grannie’s junk. I picked up a pair of dessert dishes, marked $2, and asked the girl if she’d take $1 for them.

“Yes, $1 each,” with a glare she replied.

I could have done without the attitude. Back on the shelf they went, and I hope she enjoyed packing them up at the end of the day.

At a different sale, I observed a man drop $100 cash on two different piles of art prints. Both the seller and the buyer were thrilled with the transaction, and I have no doubt that the buyer got a good deal there; the prints were authentic and lovely.

As I said, money means different things to different people.

When it was all said and done, and it was done fairly quickly today, an eclectic and useful mix of things did come home with me. Here’s the tally:

1. Two funky cookbooks (I love that title, Lode of Vittles!) for my brother Bill who owns a B&B in the Adirondack Mountains, white Pfaltzgraff bowl, and two small notepads …. from the “Free” pile
2. Fisherman’s cross-stitch for my other brother Mike    …..$2
3. Five pieces of arty-crafty materials, always useful for my New Year’s Intention Map Workshop and the upcoming “Make your Own Holiday Ornament” event …..$1
4. Tall glass vase and Waverly Garden mug ……$1
5. Garden Scissors and heavy brass pine cone (from a coo-coo clock?) ….. $1
6. Three yards of burlap… any gardener knows you can always use burlap. …..   $1
7. Biographical fiction about the life of the Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli, dated 1914 …..$1

Total expenses for the day: $7

Stay tuned for the final installment of the 2012 Yard Sale Documentation Project coming soon, where the full season’s accounting will be posted!

How much did she spend? What did she buy? Was it worth the time and effort? Does this woman need a new hobby? Does she need an intervention?

See you next time when you can decide for yourself.

 

Jeanne Fiorini is a Tarot professional and a yard sale addict who can stop any time she wants. Visit the TarotWorks website to see what Jeanne does when she’s not rummaging through other people’s stuff.

1 Comment

Yard Sale Documentation Project: October Update

October 13, 2012 at 11:50 AM (Antiques, art, bargains, Estate Sales, Garage Sales, home decor, Tag Sales, Thrifting, Yard sales)
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

I was going to wait and post all of October’s adventures at the end of the month, but so much for that idea! Today (October 13th) was such an enjoyable day in yard sale world that I had to create a post to honor the event. Here goes, beginning at last week’s entry:

Saturday October 6th

The day opens with bright sunshine: a good sign. The wind is warm and the air is moist; you can tell it’s going to rain later in the day, but for these early morning hours it’s a perfect fall day.

The Maine Today classified section listed 77 yard sales happening this weekend. Granted, some of those are in the Augusta area 30 miles away from here, but that’s still a respectable showing for an October Saturday.

Sometimes when you head out in the morning, you have a focus for the day, a goal to accomplish, an item you hope to acquire, a thing that you need to buy eventually or in the moment but don’t want to pay full retail price for. Today I was in search of costume jewelry to give to Vera for her second birthday.

We haven’t tried to turn Vera into a girlie-girl, in fact both Kate and I shun that sort of programming. And the girl is not what you’d call “delicate” in stature. But she does love “peenk” and she loves wearing Grammie’s jewelry, all of it at the same time, mostly.

I hit the mother lode on this one today, as evidenced by the photo.

  • Two pairs of clip-on earrings          $1
  • Beaded bracelet                       50 cents
  • 25-carat blue cocktail ring       50 cents
  • Turquoise beaded necklace             $1

Those items will become part of Vera’s birthday present. The black/gold beads ($1) are for me. They’re especially lovely and probably have some age, check out that fancy clasp.)

The sale next door to this one was truly fabulous: lots of wonderful pottery, kitchen ware, kids clothes and furniture, but I really didn’t need any of it. I also found, at another sale down the road, a DIVINE 1960’s low coffee table, well-crafted solid wood, about 6’ long…$10. I pondered long and hard as to where I might be able to fit that thing into a niche or corner somewhere my house, it was so cool.

With heavy heart and empty hands I left both these sales.

But I did come home with a classic Moosewood cookbook ($1) and Jill Bolte Taylor’s book, My Stroke of Insight, purchased for the rock-bottom price of one quarter. If you follow the other postings on this blog you’re sure to be hearing more about that book in the near future.

This was a good day, and considering that October is upon us, it was stellar. Could be best of the season still be ahead?

Saturday October 13th

That “best of the season” comment might have been prophetic. I did come home with some great things today, but the hallmark of this Saturday’s excursion was the classic kitch that was out there today.

Even though, as the James Taylor song goes, “the frost is on the pumpkin and the hay is in the barn,” … and the yard salers wore hats and gloves this morning ….  sales were abundant and the throngs were thronging. Let me not waste any time in sharing the joy of the funky junk that was there for the picking.

First we have this fine item: a handmade wooden cross, about 20″ high, fully electrified and bulbed-up, for what we can only guess. Those red lights are the round bulbs from the 60’s, and I shudder to think what the thing looks like when lit. Praise the lord.

Then there were these two chairs, now in poor shape but one can imagine the artful dignity they carried when new or only slightly broken in. These are more like broken down, but they still have more character that much of what I see selling in stores today.

And come on, who doesn’t want a fountain light hanging in the corner of their living room? Certain to add ambiance beyond compare to any decor. I can remember the day when seeing this in a restaurant was the guarantee of a fine dinner, no joke.

Finally, we have a plastic surfing baby monkey.

Nothing left to say on that one.

It’s only 8:30am and I’m already SO glad I dragged myself out of bed.

More seriously useful and lovely bargains were yet to cross my path on this chilly fall morning. Once the LL Bean wool/silk blend sweater coat was purchased (for $1) I was tempted to wear it on the spot, but it does need a little airing-out.

I also picked up some audio cassette tapes (useful for recording Tarot readings for those folks who still have the technology to play them back), some fancy-schmantzy body lotion (I know, that looks like a lady’s “pleasure tool” but it’s not), a 6-pack of artist’s note cards, and a bouquet of fresh flowers from a farm stand.

Total expenditure to carry home the things in the photo: $7.75.

The find of the day, however, is certainly the painting at the top of this article. Done in the 60’s by a Massachusetts artist named Ernest Perry, a quick trips across the internet shows his work to sell for around $275.

I don’t expect to sell it since I love it and it has already found a home in the stairwell gallery, but if I ever do I’m sure to make some money on it, since the woman who sold it had it priced at $1.

Praise the lord.

Jeanne Fiorini is an avid yard saler, a professional Tarot reader, a pro football fan, and a lover of dogs. Visit the TarotWorks website to learn more about Jeanne and the Tarot work!

7 Comments

Show Me A Sign

July 22, 2012 at 10:42 AM (bargains, humor, Yard sales)
Tags: , , ,

There aren’t many things that will keep me from the Saturday morning event, but a stomach bug is one of them. I gave it a valiant effort, but it didn’t work out too well.

However, this gives me a chance to review some of the qualifiers for Best Signage of the Season. (For this and other award categories you can refer to the April 21st post.)

Good signage is so important to a successful yard sale! There’s a folksy saying in Maine that declares “You can’t get there from here,” and this certainly is true for a yard sale with poor directions.

Like this one on the right from an early sale day in May: there were no other hints of a sale … anywhere. This is no help at all to the people who want to spend money on your junk.

This business to the left is what’s required to attract those salers who are at that very moment annoying non-saleing drivers with their inattention to the matter of keeping the car on the correct side of the road and other proper driving habits : colors, arrows, multiple signs to account for various approach directions; balloons are always a good idea.

This next person took a no-nonsense approach, but it seemed to work.  Clearly this man in his pajamas couldn’t bother to get dressed before attending this well-advertised sale. People can get very creative about drawing folks into their personal web of trash and treasure. One sale drew us in with mind control:

This guy — I’m SURE it was a guy– went for the big guns, flashing lights and all…… as did this guy. I will point out that the size of the sign in no way reflected the value of the goods found there. You can draw your own conclusions about that comment.

I like this simple sign below: it’s got an arrow to tell you where to drive, it’s displayed at eye level, and offers no pretense or delusion about where you’re headed. I’d rather see this than “Best Sale Ever” only to find a sorry mess like we did at what is still the prime contender for  this year’s “Worst Excuse for a Yard Sale.”

 

We’ll close with this sign, which doesn’t have anything to do with yard sale-ing but has a perfection all its own. See you next week when we resume our usual shenanigans.

2 Comments