Ever had one of these? it’s spring and many of you are probably thinking that this is the year you are finally going to commit to some serious spring cleaning by subjecting yourself to a garage sale. Of all the people that have had a garage sale, what percentage of those people would you guess consider their garage sale a success? Of those people who consider their garage sale a success, what percentage of those people would you guess are bold faced liars or are otherwise full of shit? My guess is 90%. That’s because garage salers never take into account time spent on the project. So if you are thinking about having one, my advice is read this article first. My theory is you never want to just plunge into things. Do some research. It usually pays off.
First off, do you really need a garage sale? Lets take a look at an example of a garage that probably doesn’t need a sale. Example number one below would fall into this category.
Example Number One
You see how tidy this gentleman’s garage is. That’s the first clue for you. If your garage is well organized, you probably need all of your shit in there. When you get tired of stuff and you store it haphazardly and you couldn’t care less if someone breaks into your garage and helps themselves to whatever is laying around, that’s a good sign it’s time for a sale. Also, that would be one reason to just leave your garage door open all the time. That’s a nice alternate route to take if you don’t want to bother with all the trouble of a sale. Secondly, I don’t see any item duplication, and outside of that hubcap in the foreground, I really don’t see much of anything that would sell anyway. Wait a minute here! What the hell is this guy doing? I’m not sure, but from the looks of things it appears this misguided horn-dog failed high school biology and is engaged in some kind of futile attempt to duplicate hubcaps. Well, at least he seems to have an eye for what’s hot in garage sale marketing.
This second example below is your tweener. This garage is well organized, but there are lots of
Example Number Two
duplications. Taking into account my criteria, this one’s right on the fence. Looks like the owner has trouble parting with old electronics. And stuff is starting to migrate to the floor. That’s usually a tip-off that its time to get rid of stuff, by sale or otherwise. I bet you are thinking those electronics could fetch a pretty penny at a garage sale. But you’d be surprised. You should understand going in that people are cheap. They tend to consider anything priced over $5.00 like it’s a locked up Rolex in a jewelry case. Be prepared to be disappointed. Of course after they bargain you down to $3.00, they are going to want to make sure you didn’t stick them with a mechanical turd, so be sure you have a couple of long extension cords at the ready to appease these douchenozzles.
Now if your garage looks like example three here, you might be totally beyond the point of a
Example Number Three
garage sale. What you need to do is build yourself a second garage to store this shit in before some pesky city ordinance snaps you in the ass.
If you do decide to go through with a garage sale, keep in mind there is a lot of preparation to do. For instance, I had an old cabin tent I desperately wanted to get rid of. I have tents coming out of my ass, mostly dome type. I cracked a flexible tent pole for my big dome tent one time, and emailed Coleman, explaining that I needed a replacement. They sent me a whole new tent, free! God I love that company. But now I have way too many tents. Besides two big dome tents, I have a couple of smaller ones and a couple of pup tents. That is a result of progression and family expansion. My wife and I are in compression mode now, and the smart thing at this point in our lives is give up on camping period. Too many joint replacements going on with us. If you want a tent I probably have one that would work for you. Anyway, last spring we did have a garage sale, and the cabin tent was the first thing off my premises. I hated that thing. The color codings needed to identify the 18 poles for proper conne
ctions had long since faded away, and the connection points between poles would never stay locked, so sections of poles that were angled twisted around in every direction. Assembly thus required at least two people, three if there were time constraints involved. And you have to put your tent up if you want to sell it at a garage sale. The purchasing public will think you’re a big dick that’s trying to hide something otherwise. I had to enlist the help of my neighbor to get the job done. You see us both hard a
t work in the picture above. Two hours and a roll of duct tape later, what we accomplished is shown at right. I was pretty sure that tent would attract a lot of interest, and as it turned out my instincts were correct. The first day of my sale my very first customer
was drawn immediately to it. I took a picture of him while he was checking it out in the bargain bin. That’s him on the left. I am glad I started taking pictures. Here is another one of my customers pictured below right. As you can see, he looks like a nice guy, so I didn’t pay much attention to him while
he was looking over my merchandise. I took the picture right before he started running down the street with this shopping cart full of tires. I couldn’t give shit about the tires. They weren’t even mine. That prick stole my shopping cart! I borrowed it from Target, and sort of forgot to return it. I mean, I suppose this dimwit got tired of lugging around those tires, but come on! I would have lent him the shopping cart, but he out and out stole it from me. I hope Target finds out and throws him in jail.
My Set of Keys
The two hours spent on the cabin tent was nothing compared to the frustrating afternoon I had dealing with the second most important thing I wanted to get rid of- an old car top carrier. It had been in my attic for at least thirty years. We used it once. It was one I bought from Sears, a plastic shell type that was an absolute pain in the ass to mount on car-top rails but it looked like new and I was once again certain it would be primo garage sale material. I had all the parts and accessories, knew right where they were in fact. The problem was I had locked the thing up and did not know right where the key was. I don’t know why it was not in its proper place with my set of keys. I have a key for everything I have ever needed a key for, plus a duplicate of most, two for some. I keep my set of keys well organized by throwing all of them in one desk drawer. After wasting a half hour trying out every key that had a chance of working and an hour trying to remember all the special secret hiding places I hide stuff in, I gave up and did what I always do when all else fails- searched the web. Hoping to run across a key word that would help me rig up a key, I learned how to pick a lock in multiple ways- with a hair-pin, two paper clips, two small allen wrenches, a small allen wrench/tiny screwdriver combo, and a few other methods I can’t recall. There were even videos attached to some that demonstrated their effectiveness, but none effectively worked on my Sears hard shell car top carrier. I suppose the failure could rest on my shoulders in the way I bent my paper clips and held all the improvised lock-picking tools. But I’m no moron. I can follow instructions for Pete’s sake. After all of my trial and error with the project, I gave up. It’s just what you do when you reach the point of diminishing returns in time and effort.
Desperate to rid myself of my car top carrier lest it haunt me with more angst, I resorted to the absolute fail safe method for getting rid of stuff. I set it curbside, with bag of accessories and a sign that read, “Do Not Take!!” It was gone the next morning.
Well, that’s about all you need to know about a garage sale. Good luck.
A footnote in regard to the car top carrier. About a week after it was removed from my property, my wife and I happened to be driving along one of the quieter streets of Omaha when we noticed what I am now positive was our car top carrier along the side of the road. It was beat to shit, tire scuff marks adorned the sides, and there was a huge crack running down the middle of the top. We were at a stop sign and since no one was behind me I couldn’t resist the urge to get out of the car and check it out. Sure enough, the thing was still locked. As I drove away, I couldn’t help but reflect on a couple of axioms that hold truth in all aspects of commercialism. They would be “Buyer beware,” and “You get what you pay for.”