Laugh Lines

A Garage Sale Day

It is still hard to believe, but my sisters and I finally had a big garage sale. After months of procrastination, we put the ad in the paper, made a bunch of signs and did it.

The first thing we all had to agree on was what to sell and for how much. I will admit I hate getting rid of anything. That extreme is balanced out by my minimalist sister who wants to keep nothing. My middle sister also likes to hang onto things, but she is busy keeping us all happy while we figure this out. We managed to get a ton of junk priced and ready for the big day.

Once we had everything out on those rickety make-shift tables and settled into our lawn chairs to take in the big bucks, the entertainment began. I wandered through the sales area chatting with folks—my sisters said I was worse than a used car salesman. I sold people a lot of good stuff at a great price! My youngest sister was trying to sneak away with embarrassingly old or weird items that she would then slide into the dumpster. She couldn't bear having it displayed at our sale. My middle sister’s job was to hold all the change and collect the funds at her lawn-chair-and-TV-tray setup.

We met some pretty unique garage sale enthusiasts. One couple came and bought 50 items of clothing for a quarter each. Someone whispered to me that they have a secondhand store in a nearby community, and would probably resell it all for way more money. Antique and collectible gatherers swooped into the sale and briskly exited when they realized we were only selling old junk. Families came who shopped for real needs. We threw extra stuff in their bag for free. Sprinkled in that mix of buyers were some very unusual folks who hear voices, wanted to play with the toys, and would talk our ears off. Whew!

As the sale day wore on, we received the last group of buyers: those who wanted to get the half-price deals because they knew we were tired. I couldn't believe they worked so hard at buying something for half of a dime. We finally survived the final hour and saw that the yard was empty and the sale item leftovers were looking pretty bleak. We started the cleanup process. Instead of pulling everything back into the house for the "next yard sale," we actually loaded it up and headed to the local Goodwill donation center. It was marvelous to realize that the last of the unwanted junk never came back inside. We had made enough money to pay for the advertising, split some of it up, and still buy the three of us pizza and sodas for a well-deserved treat. It took at least a week of recovery, but now we are trying to decide when to plan the next garage sale!

Pam and Kathy’s 7 Tips for Garage Sale Day

Try to have merchandise priced and ready for sale in advance.
Put the date of your sale on the calendar in advance and work towards it, or it will never happen.
Assign at least one person to sit with the change box at the purchasing area at all times.
Remove any address, phone numbers or identification information from things that could be used by buyers to find you again.
At the end of the day, gather the advertising signs you displayed so they are not left on corners beyond your sale date.
Have a plan for the unsold items to be donated to charity after the sale.
Plan a fun dinner out or treat for the garage sale staff after everything is cleaned up.