Amy emailed in the following testimonial which I thought many of you would enjoy reading:
I just wanted to let you know that we just had our most successful garage sale ever after reading your Ten Tips for a Successful Garage Sale post. For starters, our philosophy was different because we realized we had already gotten our use out of each item and so were not holding onto the “but this is what we paid for it new” syndrome.
After the sale, we also realized that a clean and empty garage is definitely worth our efforts to have the sale. (The garage had been full after our move back to Texas two years ago. We began to realize if all that stuff had not been used in that long, we really do not need it.) I think this sale proved a successful teaching tool for all of us in the blessings of minimalism. We all love jumping around freely in the newly-emptied garage!
How We Did It
We started the sale on Friday, so Thursday night we listed the sale on Craigslist. My husband created a public map on Google Maps, with directions to our house from the nearest major cross-roads. In the description of the Destination (our house), he posted sale hours and a long list of items we had for sale. It was the same text that was in the Craigslist post, but including the link in the post made it very easy for folks to find us.
We also posted signs like we had in the past, but most people said they heard about us and found us because of Craigslist and the map we placed in the ad. Very effective, indeed.
The second day of our sale we updated our Craigslist and Google Maps postings and stapled smaller, brightly colored signs to the original signs that said, “50% off Sat. 7:30 a.m.” Wow! That worked!
We sold most the remaining big stuff within minutes of opening the garage door. All the little stuff was sold off in steady streams until about 10:30 a.m., at which time we had our children take turns holding up a sign at our street corner saying, “90% off — many items FREE!”
People came in droves after that! We got rid of just about everything very quickly. It was all said and done by about 12:30 p.m..
Lessons Learned
We included our children the sale and let them set up a table of their own. One of our sons was originally miffed because he sold some of his things for way less than he wanted to, but he quickly learned the art of strategic marketing! So, all was good in the end.
The children also sold donuts and bottled waters. Those were a huge hit — and a big profit-maker, earning a dollar per donut or bottled water. They made a good return for their efforts, and were very happy about it. They learned effective salesmanship and how to talk with a variety of people.
Afterward, we had a long talk about rejoicing and giving thanks for the 90% God lets us keep from our earnings and we were able to give a much larger than usual tithe on Easter Sunday morning which gave us all so much joy! -Amy
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