Tips for Having a Successful (and Fun!) Yard Sale
Hi Everyone! Happy Monday!
As I've mentioned, last Friday/Saturday we had a yard sale, and it went so well. We had five years worth of accumulated stuff to get rid of...things we don't use anymore or that don't fit in with our new life. Our house isn't that big and my husband is anti-clutter, so this was a great thing to do. It feels so good to have our house cleaned out...we've added so many things with the babies, things were getting kind of crazy.
Anyway, I thought today I'd share some things that we though were helpful in making the sale a success:
- Advertise. I work in advertising, so of course I'm going to say this. But the more people that know about your sale the more people that will come and the more things you will sell. We put an ad in the local paper, a post on Craigslist, and my husband made these neon green signs that we hung on the major streets near our house, with arrows pointing the way. (He's an engineer and made the signs so sturdy, cutting apart metal hangars and duct-taping them to the back of the sign's four corners, zip-tying them to poles. At first I told him he was over-engineering the signs, but that's not what I meant, because the signs were perfectly made. What I meant was he brought way more skills to the sign-making process than the average person.) Oh, and when you're advertising, if you've got brand-name products, mention that. We had some nice stuff from Apple, Pottery Barn, Anthropologie etc, and I think mentioning that helped bring people our way.
- Have a 2-day sale. In our town, yard sales typically happen on Friday/Saturday. I had to take Friday off work, but doing the sale over two days was worth it. And Friday was by far our bigger day...don't know if we would have had the success we did if we did Saturday only. Also, try to plan for a time of year with good weather...it was glorious out for us and I'm sure we got more people because of it...plus it was nicer for us to be outside.
- Close down by 2 or 3 PM. We did our sale 9 AM to 5 PM, but had VERY few people the last few hours.
- Don't mark prices. We had people ask about the price of items vs mark everything. This saved time and no one seemed put off by it. Plus, it allowed us to drop prices as we got closer to the end of the sale. But if you go this route, discuss with your significant other general prices for things. We were giving wildly different quotes to people at the beginning...good to have things in sync.
- Have lots of change. We had $50 in $5s and $50 in $1s to start (also a pile of change from our piggy bank). A couple people also asked us to break $100s, so might be good to have cash on hand to do that as well. We also said OK to checks, although only a few people wrote them.
- Involve small children. We had the twins in carriers almost the entire time (except naps), and it was a good way to engage with people/made the time nice for us. And I don't have a control group so I don't know for sure, but I would bet it increased sales. If I could do it over again, I'd put out a sign that said all proceeds were going to the kids' college fund...figure that couldn't hurt.
- If people buy a pile of stuff, give them a discount. And tell them up front that you'll do it, eg, Them: "How much are these books?" Me: "$1 each, but if you buy a bunch I'll make you a deal."
- Be willing to let stuff go cheap. Lots of shoes at our garage sale, as I can't fit into my pre-pregnancy size. Did it hurt to let my $150* Nordstrom heels go for $5? Yeah, but I can't wear them anymore, and I was just going to take them to Goodwill anyway. Plus I'd worn them lots over the years. And $5 per item--that starts to add up.
- Take pictures of things that are hard to let go. I want to keep objects because of the stories attached. It was easier to let them go if I used my phone to take a picture of the item before it was carted off.
- Take everything left to Goodwill. Saturday end of day we loaded everything left into the back of the Jeep. There wasn't much. But it felt good not to reconsider and bring stuff back in the house.
All in all, our garage sale was a great success. Hope these tips help some of you. Can't wait to do it again!
XOXO
*Not all my shoes are so pricey, just FYI. Although I'm not above splurging, clearly.