Garage sales are a great way to get rid of excess things in your home and make a little money. I’ve compiled some great tips for organizing your next garage sale so it runs smoothly and attract more buyers. change for people when you don’t have any money to give them. Stock up on $1 bills and change, specifically quarters.
Some people prefer to have a check out table with a money box.
This is fine as long as you’ll always have someone sitting at the table to help people check out and to watch the money box. I’ve heard stories of people distracting garage sale sellers while another person steals the money box, so be careful. If you’re afraid of this or if you’d rather be walking around, assisting buyers, wear a fanny pack with the money.
Hang and group like clothing.
It’s a lot easier for customers to browse clothing when it’s hung up rather than folded on a table. Plus, either you or they will have to fold the clothing again after picking it up to look at it. Save yourself and potential buyers time by hanging as much clothing as possible.
Use tables to display items.
Buyers don’t want to have to crawl around on the ground or dig through boxes to see items. Don’t have a plethora of tables? Borrow them from friends, neighbors, and family members.
Use zippered bags to combine sets and keep little accessory pieces together.
If you’re selling a toy like the pony below, tape the bag of accessories to the toy. This technique keeps all the little pieces together and the buyer can see everything that comes with the toy.
Display like items together.
Think about it– when you go to a store aren’t there sections where like items are displayed together? That’s no different when it comes to having a garage sale at your home. Make it easy for potential buyers to find things they may be interested in. If you want to take it to the next level you could write the name of each section (toys, kitchen, home decor, books, etc.) on a piece of cardboard or poster board and display the signs accordingly.
Have a free box/pile conveniently placed closest to the street.
This will catch potential buyers’ attention, causing them to stop and check out your sale. What do you put in the free pile? Things you were going to donate anyway, things you don’t think would sell, or things you wouldn’t mind giving away for free.
Price EVERYTHING.
Some buyers feel awkward approaching sellers to ask for prices on items, so some will just move on. Think about it when you shop in a store. Don’t you like to know the price of something from the the get-go instead of having to hunt someone down for a price check?
Keep the pricing simple too.
Since you’re mostly dealing with cash it would be really annoying to figure out the math of items costing $3.99, $4.49, etc. Price things in $.50 or $.25 increments so it’s easier to and faster to check people out.
Use stickers or tape to attach the price tag to items.
Or if you have a lot of like items you can price them as sets. The only thing about this is remembering how much the items cost. You could make a cheat sheet saying how much the non-priced items cost so if you can’t remember you don’t have to seek out of the box they were in.
I hope you’ve found these tips to be helpful. It may seem like a lot of prep work, but putting in some time to make sure your garage sale runs smoothly will only benefit you in the end. Do you have any garage sale organization tips or tricks you’d like to share?
