Hey everyone! As I did some spring cleaning I started to clear out a lot of things I no longer need, books I've read, movies I no longer want, and clothes that I can get rid of. I realized "A-HA, a perfect time to start getting together stuff for a yardsale!"
Problem is, living in an apartment, we don't have a yard.
I was wondering if some people wanted to combine things and have a yard sale together. A "Multi-household cooperative yard sale" of sorts. Someone could volunteer their yard and the co-op could even sell food at it. I think June is a great time for a yard sale, since it isn't too hot yet and the yardsale/garage sale/tag sale season is just starting to pop up.
Thoughts, ideas, volunteers?
Co-Op Yard Sale?
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Rich Menashe
- Posts: 222
- Joined: Sun Oct 22, 2006 1:07 pm
yardless sale
great idea-
how about one in the coop, elks, title parking lot.
rich
how about one in the coop, elks, title parking lot.
rich
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John Leary
- Hardcore Co-op Volunteer
- Posts: 559
- Joined: Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:32 pm
- Location: Metuchen
- Contact:
I'd have some stuff!
I think it would be absolutely awesome to do this in the Co-op parking lot. I'll ask the Elks about it as soon as we have a date.
It occurs to me that Evite has a "suggest a date" feature for events. We could send out an Evite invitation and let everyone work out a date there. Does that seem like a good idea?
If we do this at the Co-op, I'll donate all the proceeds for my stuff to the Co-op. I wouldn't ask anyone else to do that, but it might be cool if others decide to.
It occurs to me that Evite has a "suggest a date" feature for events. We could send out an Evite invitation and let everyone work out a date there. Does that seem like a good idea?
If we do this at the Co-op, I'll donate all the proceeds for my stuff to the Co-op. I wouldn't ask anyone else to do that, but it might be cool if others decide to.
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Danielle Geist
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Wed Aug 27, 2008 2:38 pm
- Location: Brooklyn
I've been thinking more about how we could do this. We could get sticky tags and when people bring stuff they write their name on it and the price. That way we can have one "cash register" area, and when people buy stuff, the cashier would write down the name and the amount. At the end of the yard sale, we could tabulate the individual profit of each person to give to them. This way we'd be able to put all the alike items together for an easier shopping experience.
I don't mind spear-heading this event, but John, I feel it would be more benefitial for you to make connections with the Elks.
I don't mind spear-heading this event, but John, I feel it would be more benefitial for you to make connections with the Elks.
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John Leary
- Hardcore Co-op Volunteer
- Posts: 559
- Joined: Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:32 pm
- Location: Metuchen
- Contact:
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Morris Kafka
- Posts: 163
- Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2007 1:16 am
yard sale ideas
Hi All!
Great idea. A few notes: I've been volunteering for and helping to run the yard sales for the 2nd Ward Club in NB for perhaps 20 years. You will need a permit for any yard sale in NB - which is applied for at the city clerk office. If the co-op itself were running the sale for charity and has not for profit papers it ight be free, in general the permit is $5.
For many years the sales have been at my place up the street from the co-op. Some years the co-op has sold stuff or we've liquidated stuff as a favor for them.
We moved the sale dates from June to Sept. as weather seemed more favorable and more people are setting up housekeeping in Sept. but June sales were successful.
In terms of pricing stuff I really suggest you do it flea market style, if people want to sell stuff themselves and make money they should set up their own table and their own money box and use their own tags. A central cashier will go insane trying to figure stuff out and there are bound to be problems. I've had people walk up to me and say "will you take $5 on this item marked $20?" and I will say "no" and then turn around and they told the central cashier I said it was $5. This happened more times than I can count, and this was at a charity sale which is sad. Ergo my suggestion, people monitor their own table and do their own negotiating and cash taking.
Beware too of people who want to donate stuff for the co-op to sell. Most people have good intentions but some want to get rid of things that won't sell and the co-op will end up having to dispose of them. Boundaries must be set; for example no furniture too heavy for one person to move or in bad shape, etc. People can get indignant when you won't take their donations, but better than hurting your back or having to spend your profits to have them hauled away. I've also had people just dump big black garbage bags of dirty gross clothes at my doorstep as "donations" without asking first. Not to be a downer, just want to warn folks in advance!
I can loan out some tables and chairs from the block club if people want to borrow them & I am around at the chosen date.
Great idea. A few notes: I've been volunteering for and helping to run the yard sales for the 2nd Ward Club in NB for perhaps 20 years. You will need a permit for any yard sale in NB - which is applied for at the city clerk office. If the co-op itself were running the sale for charity and has not for profit papers it ight be free, in general the permit is $5.
For many years the sales have been at my place up the street from the co-op. Some years the co-op has sold stuff or we've liquidated stuff as a favor for them.
We moved the sale dates from June to Sept. as weather seemed more favorable and more people are setting up housekeeping in Sept. but June sales were successful.
In terms of pricing stuff I really suggest you do it flea market style, if people want to sell stuff themselves and make money they should set up their own table and their own money box and use their own tags. A central cashier will go insane trying to figure stuff out and there are bound to be problems. I've had people walk up to me and say "will you take $5 on this item marked $20?" and I will say "no" and then turn around and they told the central cashier I said it was $5. This happened more times than I can count, and this was at a charity sale which is sad. Ergo my suggestion, people monitor their own table and do their own negotiating and cash taking.
Beware too of people who want to donate stuff for the co-op to sell. Most people have good intentions but some want to get rid of things that won't sell and the co-op will end up having to dispose of them. Boundaries must be set; for example no furniture too heavy for one person to move or in bad shape, etc. People can get indignant when you won't take their donations, but better than hurting your back or having to spend your profits to have them hauled away. I've also had people just dump big black garbage bags of dirty gross clothes at my doorstep as "donations" without asking first. Not to be a downer, just want to warn folks in advance!
I can loan out some tables and chairs from the block club if people want to borrow them & I am around at the chosen date.
I volunteer to be a seller/cashier at this event. [as long as the date does not conflict with anything already planned]
Re Morris' good points -
1) we might tell people, if they are dropping off donations, they must agree to pick up what is not sold.
I have also seen people use garage sales as a dumping ground to get rid of garbage.
2) re pricing - we might make a policy [if we have a central cashier] that whatever the item is marked, that is it's price - until say - one or two hours before closing, when we might negotiate.
3) oh-oh- now it occurs to me that if we accept donations we might end up having to price every item. So I think we should require that anything left off to be sold be clearly marked with the price.
Another idea - we could do it as a fund-raiser for the co-op. Then we wouldn't have to keep track of who sold what.
Perhaps have one table - with items of some value - if there are some people who want to sell their item and keep the proceeds.
ellen
Re Morris' good points -
1) we might tell people, if they are dropping off donations, they must agree to pick up what is not sold.
I have also seen people use garage sales as a dumping ground to get rid of garbage.
2) re pricing - we might make a policy [if we have a central cashier] that whatever the item is marked, that is it's price - until say - one or two hours before closing, when we might negotiate.
3) oh-oh- now it occurs to me that if we accept donations we might end up having to price every item. So I think we should require that anything left off to be sold be clearly marked with the price.
Another idea - we could do it as a fund-raiser for the co-op. Then we wouldn't have to keep track of who sold what.
Perhaps have one table - with items of some value - if there are some people who want to sell their item and keep the proceeds.
ellen
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Danielle Geist
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Wed Aug 27, 2008 2:38 pm
- Location: Brooklyn
Morris does bring up some good points. I would hope that co-op members would be respectful, but I guess one should be wary of old, smelly clothes and garbage.
I think we could do something like 25% (or another percentage) of the profits go towards the co-op. I don't mind footing the $5 to get the permit.
Morris, what do you think of Ellenr's idea of having the ticketed price be the price and then maybe, an hour before the sale ends we could cut prices in half or something? Anyone who brings things MUST have them tagged and priced beforehand and must show up at the end of the day to receive their profits ONLY AFTER collecting their unsold objects.
I hadn't thought about big things like furniture though. Maybe, depending on the size and where we have it, we just won't be able to fit it at the yardsale.
Also, I think it would be nice if we had a clothing rack (ex: http://www.organizeit-online.com/images ... t_Rack.jpg) for the clothes. Anyone have one they could donate? I would be okay buying a bunch of hangers that people could hang their clothes on.
I think we could do something like 25% (or another percentage) of the profits go towards the co-op. I don't mind footing the $5 to get the permit.
Morris, what do you think of Ellenr's idea of having the ticketed price be the price and then maybe, an hour before the sale ends we could cut prices in half or something? Anyone who brings things MUST have them tagged and priced beforehand and must show up at the end of the day to receive their profits ONLY AFTER collecting their unsold objects.
I hadn't thought about big things like furniture though. Maybe, depending on the size and where we have it, we just won't be able to fit it at the yardsale.
Also, I think it would be nice if we had a clothing rack (ex: http://www.organizeit-online.com/images ... t_Rack.jpg) for the clothes. Anyone have one they could donate? I would be okay buying a bunch of hangers that people could hang their clothes on.
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Morris Kafka
- Posts: 163
- Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2007 1:16 am
more thoughts on yard sale
Good points Danielle!
1) The block club has a stand up, rotating round clothing rack that can be borrowed for the day - it is the kind you see at department stores. We also have a collection of hangers that can be borrowed.
2) If someone is a wiz of a cashier and they have a cash register they might be able to ring everything up quick enough but at peak times when people might form a line (one can hope the sae is like that) you are placing a big burden on the cashier to invoice what comes from each member that wants to sell their own stuff. You'd need a person to act as accountant to sit next to the cashier and keep tallies for each seller - that might really take some of the stress off and help reduce error . Basically you are setting up a consignment shop for one day so the possibility for error is high. When you are dealing with people's stuff (even their cast offs) and their money you add potential headaches to the mix.
It is a lot simpler if people just donate to the co-op; those who want to sell their own stuff might be best served by a separate sale.
One advantage you pointed out is that people would have to pre-price their items and would not get their money until after they cleaned up whatever was left over. This would help minimize clean up challenges if everyone did come back and tend to their stuff - there is always the chance that there will be rain and things will be ruined and abandoned, or someoone will have a problem and not be able to come back so there needs to be some clean up crew on hand to facilitate prompt clean up of the lot & be good neighbors.
Of course if people bring a lot of stuff that sells and the co-op gets a good percentage of the funds. I haven't attempted to sell things for different folks at a centralized sale in years, with the exception of say one or two large items total at a sale that someone wanted to share the profit with the club but were sort of valuable & they still wanted something back.
So the most important aspects are being very clear with the pre-planning and making sure the guidelines are evenly adhered to while trying to make things as fun and productive as possible. Definitely go for some light, inexpensive refreshments (coffee, lemonade & cupcakes, brownies or cookies are usually hits with our sale) and also consider people who might want to donate baby houseplants or divisions from their garden, some years we give awaysuch plants with sales over $10 or sell them cheaply just to encourage gardening.
1) The block club has a stand up, rotating round clothing rack that can be borrowed for the day - it is the kind you see at department stores. We also have a collection of hangers that can be borrowed.
2) If someone is a wiz of a cashier and they have a cash register they might be able to ring everything up quick enough but at peak times when people might form a line (one can hope the sae is like that) you are placing a big burden on the cashier to invoice what comes from each member that wants to sell their own stuff. You'd need a person to act as accountant to sit next to the cashier and keep tallies for each seller - that might really take some of the stress off and help reduce error . Basically you are setting up a consignment shop for one day so the possibility for error is high. When you are dealing with people's stuff (even their cast offs) and their money you add potential headaches to the mix.
It is a lot simpler if people just donate to the co-op; those who want to sell their own stuff might be best served by a separate sale.
One advantage you pointed out is that people would have to pre-price their items and would not get their money until after they cleaned up whatever was left over. This would help minimize clean up challenges if everyone did come back and tend to their stuff - there is always the chance that there will be rain and things will be ruined and abandoned, or someoone will have a problem and not be able to come back so there needs to be some clean up crew on hand to facilitate prompt clean up of the lot & be good neighbors.
Of course if people bring a lot of stuff that sells and the co-op gets a good percentage of the funds. I haven't attempted to sell things for different folks at a centralized sale in years, with the exception of say one or two large items total at a sale that someone wanted to share the profit with the club but were sort of valuable & they still wanted something back.
So the most important aspects are being very clear with the pre-planning and making sure the guidelines are evenly adhered to while trying to make things as fun and productive as possible. Definitely go for some light, inexpensive refreshments (coffee, lemonade & cupcakes, brownies or cookies are usually hits with our sale) and also consider people who might want to donate baby houseplants or divisions from their garden, some years we give awaysuch plants with sales over $10 or sell them cheaply just to encourage gardening.
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Rich Menashe
- Posts: 222
- Joined: Sun Oct 22, 2006 1:07 pm
the rack
I have a clothing rack to use-
I have a million hangers-
Does anyone else have them-?
People haggle at garage sales a fixed price is not ideal-
We could have a tiered system-
Black is a fixed price red is any price-
Yellow is 25% or some mix-
Anything i bring would be please take it i am happy to get rid of it.
We could do a run to the salvation army/goodwill for the leftovers-
If we get smelly dirty clothes we can put them in the clothing box and let those guys discard them or clean them and reuse them-
Music would be fun-
If we can’t use the elks lot maybe we can use the other side of the title company they are closed on weekends or at least Sunday i think-
The church is open on Sunday too-
Rich
I have a million hangers-
Does anyone else have them-?
People haggle at garage sales a fixed price is not ideal-
We could have a tiered system-
Black is a fixed price red is any price-
Yellow is 25% or some mix-
Anything i bring would be please take it i am happy to get rid of it.
We could do a run to the salvation army/goodwill for the leftovers-
If we get smelly dirty clothes we can put them in the clothing box and let those guys discard them or clean them and reuse them-
Music would be fun-
If we can’t use the elks lot maybe we can use the other side of the title company they are closed on weekends or at least Sunday i think-
The church is open on Sunday too-
Rich
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Rich Menashe
- Posts: 222
- Joined: Sun Oct 22, 2006 1:07 pm
individualism
we could have a color coded or similar system where we write the amount the item sold for on each tag and total it up at the end .
but donations would be the best.
rich
but donations would be the best.
rich