Thrift stores - rising prices? - Page 2

 

wrote:


My wife almost lives at thrift stores.  She says prices are up, but
the patronage is down, if anything.
That's just a snapshot around here.
Maybe prices are higher because of less business?

--Vic

 

On Thu, 3 Dec 2009, Lenona wrote:


In the old days, such stores were either intended or perceived
as being for the poor, and the prices reflected that.

The "clients" have probably shifted to people with more money,
and so yes, they raise the prices.  The more they can take in,
the more they have for whatever projects are funded by the store.

So long as their customers were poor, then they'd keep the prizes
low, but once that changed, they realized they could raise
prices and thus increase revenue, to match increases in expenses.
The food banks here are saying that demand is up, yet donations
are down, so any fundraising is likely to try to bring in more
money.

They may have things fixed so someone without money can get
things for free or low cost.

Another issue may be that too many people are going into such
stores, buying cheap and then turning around and selling it
elsewhere for a profit.  I know it's been talked about, and I
know I saw four people with barcode readers at the largest
used book sale here in October, just rifling through the books
and pulling the things they can make lots of money on.  They
don't even need to know what the book is or anything about
its value.  So if that is happening, it's not much of a surprise
that the groups are raising prices, why not make more profit
when others are making more profit off the sale?

I do get the impression (and it's subjective) that many of
the used book sales here are trying to be selective in what
they take, I definitely noticed it with some community group
rummage sales.  They find it's too much work otherwise, they
have to deal with all the donations in the first place, and
then often have to deal with it after the sale.  People donate
broken things, and they donate obscure items, and in both
cases it requires someone with the right interest to come
by and want it.  So they get selective and then feel they
can raise prices, since they have done some of the work
of the resellers.  If find this a not so great situation,
despite a first hand experience with all that gets left
over, because it is the odd and obscure items that make
me want to go to used book and rummage sales, and while
I do buy bestsellers at used book sales, the majority of
books I bring home are more obscure, and I'm finding I
am bringing home less (presumably because the book
sales are getting selective).

    Michael

 

On Thu, 3 Dec 2009, Lenona wrote:


I'd agree with that somewhat but it still varies from shop to
shop.  I shop for records mostly and sometimes a manager gets it
into his or her head that records are incredibly valuable and
puts a $10 price tag on some worthless record.  But then a month
or so later they don't sell so the prices all go back to 50 cents.

If I want something I'll buy it, even if it's a bit high since
the proceeds generally go to a good cause.

My philosphy is to make a regular rotation to all of the shops
in the area as it's always fun to see what shows up and people
are very nice in those places.