Garage sale success

We survived our yard sale this past weekend and I would call it a success. Not only did we sell all of the large items, we made some decent money. Overall, we made almost $800.

I thought I'd share some tips that made it work. Some are mine, some I learned other places.

Advertise- I have always thought signs were important- that's a no-brainer. Easy to read, easy to follow. Make them all the same color & look the same so people know they are following your signs. Last year I advertized on ksl.com & put a flier on the community board at Harmon's. I did both again, in addition to using craigslist.com. I had great response from both websites, with people emailing or calling with questions, and some people pulling up with maps they had printed from the internet. (What did we do before mapquest?)

Organize- We had items from 13 different families, so this was key. We set up zones for similar items, so people could tell what they were looking at. This brings me to my new favorite tip:

THE MAN TABLE! I saw this on Studio 5 a few days before our yard sale. Put a table full of guy things right in front so men will see it when they drive by. Women have a hard time convincing men to stop, but this grabs their interest. It was amazing to see this work! It wouldn't have been any more effective if we had a big sign that said "Men shop here." They naturally went there while the women went everywhere else.

We sold all kinds of crazy stuff off that table- a singing deer head, a singing lobster, a weed whacker, a hard hat, playing cards, a tackle box... Even movies and a hiking back pack that went unnoticed the first day were gone in a few minutes after I moved them to that table. Try it for yourselves!

Also, clothes are sometimes hard to get rid of. Hang the nicer ones so people can see what you have. When those sell, refill the hangers with others. We laid most of the clothes out (NEATLY FOLDED) on blankets on the grass so people weren't digging through piles. I always feel gross doing that with other peoples' stuff. Yuck!

We priced EVERYTHING so people didn't have to ask how much things cost.

We had a free/gratis box by the curb, which people would stop for and then buy other stuff.

We passed out shopping bags and boxes, which some poeple filled and then came back for another! It is easier to pick up lots of stuff if you have somewhere to put it!

Oh- one more-The Sweet Spot. On day two I set a card table over park of my flower bed that had been trampled the day before. This spot was on the way to where we were collecting money. I noticed that the table was a little empty, so I put things from another table there. Soon, they were gone too. People would grab the little things I put there on there way to pay- like candy bars in the checkout line at the grocery store! Find your "sweet spot" and keep it loaded!

There's a few things that worked for us. If you are feeling energetic enough to have a yard sale, good luck and have fun.