Hello and how are your weekends starting off??
So far I have only wasted about 3 hours sleeping. I will state again that morning is not my forte, and 5am should only be used for emergencies!
But… I got up and coffeed myself into consciousness and ended up awake enough to set up our sale down at Margies.
We set the gazebo up on the lawn by the driveway with attractive goods – Margies knitwear, nice crockery, Jeff’s arrowhead jewellry, and some of my jams/sauces etc.
Of course, the advertised 8am start is ignored by the frantic, desperate, habitual Garage Sale Lurkers, who turned up at 6.45am!!!
Of course not even half the stuff was set up or ready – but I said if they had money they could come in!! Actually those early birds bought enough stuff that made it worth the inconvenience of trying to manage customers against actually getting properly set up!
Our layout worked really well – first past the nice stuff under the gazebo & Jeff who was greeting people and keeping an eye on what was happening at the front. (In between reading the magazines he bought off Fiona!)
Funny thing – see that cushion he has parked his bum on? Well… Ruby walked all the way down her rather long driveway and out the front and back into the driveway of Margies home carting this cushion for Jeff so the poor dear ‘didn’t get hemorrhoids tonight!’ Ahhhhh nurses! What would we do without them??!!
Anyway, back to layout. People were basically funneled down the drive and did a nice loop, walking past every part of the sale and back out.
Having a combined sale is a good idea. We had 4 households joining in. At times it was a little complicated sorting out sales when a person might buy several things from each of us – but we managed!
It also meant more people to watch all areas and deal with multiple customers/questions at once.
And for the customers, it means greater variety. I remember giving up on going to garage sales in Canberra where you would travel substantial distances to go to a ‘Garage Sale’ that would consist on one card table with a few things on it!!
I had baked a banana cake, Ruby supplied scones and Margie had the coffee going. Its a lot easier to take a tea break at a garage sale than at the markets!! (The loo is closer too!!)
We were so lucky with the weather. Considering the rain we had yesterday and a good portion of last night! Sunshine brought the people in!
Everyone sold a good amount of stuff – and I am really happy to report that Jeff & I got close to $500!!! Couldn’t believe it! (Actually I shouldn’t be that proud. Bottom line is that we have too much crap!)
That is really going to help out in the Texas-Spending-Money-Dept!
I don’t wear a watch but I was thinking at one point.. must be getting close to 3pm… should I start packing?
er – when you get up unusually early you misjudge time a fair bit. It was 11.30am!!
Eventually it was after 3pm and things had really quietened down so we packed up to leave Margie in peace. It was nice not having so much to have to pack back into boxes!
Mission accomplished!
Cheers
I have had combined yard sales with an old co-worker a few times down in the “city”, and we ran into the same issues with people showing up at 6:30 for an 8am sale. Congrats on a successful day, though. Even if you have a lot of crap, at least you’re on the way to less crap 😀
lol! On my way to less crap!! I reckon I could make that a slogan! 😀
Seems the early birds are a fact of life that comes along with garage sales. We heard some crazy stories from some of our customers. One lot had dealers rummaging through their garage at 4.30am!!! As you can imagine – there were ‘words’ lol
Love the necklaces. I wish I had been close enough to come.
Thank-you – I will tell Jeff 🙂 The arrowheads he actually bought off a young Cherokee fellow from Ohio and has been wrapping them in copper to make necklaces. They have turned out so well!