Me and my sister one night decided to watch Hoarders for the first time. We were giddy with anticipation, expecting a good laugh over a bucket of popcorn. That didn't happen. It actually made us sad. The episode we watched, the state took the family's kids. In order to get them back, she had to dehoardify her house. Any sane person would have thrown away the used 7-11 cup laying on the garbage heap, along with everything else, just to get their kids backs. But this woman wasn't sane.
So, before the insanity creeps into my house...with the help of kids closet...I am dehoardifying.
This Spring I'm using Kids Closet to do the job that must be done. Kids Closet is a traveling consignment store. You pay $12.50 for a consignment fee, then the split is 70% you, 30% them. They also do promotions to help you reduce your consignment fee.
The object is to gather all your unused kid items, tag and sell. To do this, you should have some kind of strategy. I don't have it down too perfection yet, but I'm trying. I started early this year with organizing my items. You need to freshly launder your clothes. I know, they've been sitting in a box all winter, why would you need to wash them? For that exact reason...they need a fresh smell. They sell better that way, plus it gives you a chance to review the items for stains and tears. Once washed I neatly fold and bring upstairs and I start typing. Kids closet has a software program that you use on their website. You type in your item with description. This is nice because you can stop at any point, save and continue on with your day. Then come back at another time when the kids aren't screaming, or need to be picked up from school. Also during the sale, you can monitor your inventory and see what is selling, and what isn't.
Pricing. I know you LOVED that dress on your little girl, it brought out the blue in her eyes, but guess what, I don't care. I have no emotional attachment to that dress. Don't care if it is Gymboree, its not worth $15 resale. I will wait for half price day. So, instead of waiting for that dress to sell, go ahead and list it for $8-$10. With that price point you will more likely get a buyer on the first day. Last day is half price day, and you want your items to sell before then. Remember, you want this stuff out of your house, and make a little cash on the side. Don't get greedy. But don't give it away either. Again, you want to make a little cash on the side. If your not sure what its worth, look it up. That's one of the nice things about doing your inventory on the computer. You can open up a tab and see what Old Navy cotton shorts are worth these days. Not much. They have sales all the time. You can price $5 but they will not sell until half price day. So you might as well price them at $2-3 so that they sell on the first day. If you have a hard to find item, like slim or husky, you can price a little more, because those are difficult items to find. If you have the matching bloomers for that dress...put it with them! Personally, I'm more likely to buy the dress with the bloomers and pay a little more, than the dress without. Shirt/short combos are also a good sell. It makes consignment shopping easy. Don't have to bother with trying to find matching items. But don't despair if you don't have a "set", I find myself looking for singles because of my daughters sizing. She's a 4/5 top, but she can only wear a size 3/4 shorts. Thats the great thing about shopping consignment...anything goes!
Brands. Everyone knows Gymboree, TCPlace, and Gap. So they are easier to price...but the other high quality brands like Speechless, Vigoss and Mini Boden can be difficult because not everyone knows those brands. With those brands, you have to let the quality of the item speak for itself. So while you are shopping, you may see something marked high, look at the quality...it may be worth that little extra. Everyone also knows Target and Walmart brand clothes too...remember what you paid for that cute little Circo t-shirt? $5? You're not going to make your money back. So price accordingly, you will easily sell it, and still make money.
Once I've typed in all my items, I carry them down into the dungeon of my home, and they sit until I get enough courage to print my tags. To my surprise I had 344 items. Let me rephrase that. 344 ITEMS! Think about that...even if I only get a $1. for each item, thats $344 dollars I didn't have before. That's just my first batch of items, I still have kid toys to tag!
Once I hit publish on this blog, I will go downstairs and conquer tagging. I do this by getting out the whiskey, hangers, and safety pins. I'll have the iron ready if something needs a quick smooth over. Once I get a group done, I will put them in a box, according to gender and size and be done. Did I say whiskey? I meant coffee. Irish Coffee.
4 comments:
Great blog! I'm a first time consignor and you have put pricing into perspective. I now feel a little more confident on how to price my items. You're right, I haven't even made a dent in my stock pile and I'm already at 100 items. I better get busy!
Pricing can be tricky...for both seller and buyer. You put a lot of effort into preparing your items to be sold, and you want a fair price. And Buyers have to remember this isn't a garage sale. So thought does need to be put into pricing by both.
I wish they had a place like this in my state. It seems great. I usually re-sell my clothes to Once Upon A Child but I know (or at least I think) that I could get better prices elsewhere. I'll have to to investigate to see if we have anything similar around here!
Laurie...look up kids closet, they do consignment sales in several different states. Its a little more work than going to Once Upon A Child, but you do get more cash.
Post a Comment