Consignment Sale Prep 101 - Clothing

 

Have you thought about consigning at a children's consignment sale, but are intimidated because you have no idea how to transform the mound of clothes and toys into money?

I felt the same way 6 years and 11 consignment sales ago when I first started. I looked at the mountains of clothes and toys that my children had outgrown and was so intimidated I almost didn't even start.  I had a friend who encouraged me and talked me through preparing for my first sale.  It was definitely worth the effort.  I averaged $350 at each sale and there are two sales a year, so that's $700 a year for clearing stuff out of our house.

After both consigning at and working at over 10 consignment sales in 3 different states, I have figured out how to tackle the whole consignment prep process in smaller, more manageable steps.

First

Choose the sale you want to consign with. There are many factors to consider; proximity of the sale, percentage you earn, dates of the sale, recommendations of friends.

Once you've chosen and registered for the sale, take 15-30 minutes to thoroughly read the sale's guidelines. This is important and will save you a lot of time and frustration in the long run. Since every sale is operated a little differently, be sure to read your sale's guidelines closely.  And once you've read them and signed up to consign, go back and read the guidelines one more time.

Second

I keep 3-4 plastic storage tubs in the basement to hold clothes and toys for the consignment sale.  You may have noticed in the picture that my 3-4 tubs are now 6 tubs and boxes.  That's because we're cleaning out and getting ready for another military move. 

Throughout the year, I put any piece of clothing that no longer fits or my child no longer likes into the tub. That way when the next sale time comes around, I already have most of the clothing ready to go. In addition, I take about an hour and go through my 10-year old's closet with him {here}. I also encourage my children to go through their own clothing, toys and books and find items to be consigned by letting them earn the income from the items they contribute.

Once you collect all the items you want to consign, you want to separate them into the following categories: boy's clothing by size, girl's clothing by size, toys, books, DVDs, and shoes. You'll prep each category entirely before moving onto the next.

Shoes

Starting with shoes and boots, check each pair and make sure they're in good condition. Clean them up with a damp cloth. Attach the shoes together with a zip tie, ribbon or large safety pin. It's best to connect them in such a way so that folks can try the shoes on. If there's absolutely no way to connect the shoes, then put them together in a plastic bag. I've seen too many shoppers tear the bag open so they can try the shoes on and then just leave the separate shoes laying around when they don't choose to purchase them. When that happens, your shoes are less likely to sell because a shopper has to find the 2 matching shoes and the price tag that was on the bag.  To increase the likelyhood of your shoes selling, make it possible for the shoppers to try them on (if at all possible).

Once you've got all your shoes and boots ready, then enter the information into the sale's pricing program. By pricing like items at the same time, you can make sure that your pricing strategy remains consistent.  I found that when I just priced items in no particular order, I'd price similar items very differently on different days.  I guess some days I was rushed and didn't give much thought to a reasonable price.  It's best if you price all similar items at the same time so that you can deliberately price your items.

Preparing Clothing

When you're ready to tackle the clothes you have ready, chose either boy clothes or girl clothes to start with and then handle one size at a time. Once you've pulled all the items for that size, separate them into similar items; tops, pants, shorts, sweaters, pajamas, coats, etc. Take one of the groups and put them on hangers. Make sure that you've checked your sale's website to see if there is a limit on what kind of hanger you can use. Some sales only let you use wire hangers and others will only let you use plastic hangers.

Check your sale's website, but every sale that I know of wants you to hang your clothes on the hanger with the hook facing to the left.  The hanger hook will look like a question mark.  (see yellow hanger in photo below).

Tops, Sweaters, Dresses and Coats

Take the time to iron items that are very wrinkled or creased from storage. You don't have to go crazy since your items will get wrinkled in the crush of the sale, but the better your items look the more likely they are to sell.

When you hang tops, sweater, dresses or coats on a hanger double check that the neck of the item will remain on the hanger. During the sale your hanger and item will be twisted, pulled and pushed around. If your item ends up on the floor, it's not very likely that it will be sold. You want to do everything you can to make sure that shirt stays on that hanger through the shopping equivalent of a tornado. One you have the item on the hanger try pulling it to one side to see if it will slip off the hanger. If it does slip off the hanger, either chose a larger hanger or add a safety pin to the top of the item to keep in on the hanger.

Button all buttons on shirts. Zip the zipper of coats. If tops have items that can be separated, like belts or ties, safety pin those items to the shirt so they don't get lost.

Once all items are prepared on hangers, sit down to enter them into the pricing program. Enter all similar items, for example all tee-shirts, then all sweaters, then all jackets and then all coats. This allows you to be consistent in your pricing.

When you've completed entering all items, then move onto the next category But keep each group together by size and category. Once you've finished putting all items on hangers and entered them into program, move onto the pants, shorts and skirts.

Pants, Shorts and Skirts

Hang all pants on hangers. If you are using hanger with built in clips, make sure that the clips are holding the pants securely. If you are using safety pins on wire hangers, the best way to hang them is pinned to the top of the hanger. This gives them more stability on the hanger and keeps them from slipping around on the hanger. Also, pin them at the furthest sides of the waist band, giving them additional stability.

Enter all like items into the pricing program in groups, for example enter all jeans, then all slacks, then all athletic pants.

Tagging Clothing

When I've completed entering the prices for all of one size of clothing I print the tags out. I prefer to tag and complete each size before I move onto the next size so I can minimize the mess in my house.

Print tags out on card stock. It's worth the little extra cost to purchase card stock, don't try to skimp by using printer paper.  I've seen many, many items that have lost their tag at the sale because the tag was printed on regular printer paper. The problem is that the tornado that is a consignment sale takes that paper tag, rips it off and whisks it away. Once your item has lost its tag it can't be sold. You will have done all this work to sell these items and then your item won't be able to be sold because it doesn't have a tag on it.  Take the extra time to purchase and use card stock. I buy mine at Wal-mart in the paper section.

Some folks use colored card stock so that they can find their items that haven't sold at the end of the sale. I highly recommend only using white card stock. I've seen too many instances where the colored card stock won't work with the scanner. Buyers get frustrated and will sometimes chose not to bother with waiting for the scanner to fight with the colored card stock. You don't want to lose a sale because you're using colored card stock. 

 To make finding my items at the end of the sale easier, I do take a colored marker and make a line across the top of the tag to help me distinguish my items.

Be sure to check the with the directions for your sale to know where to place the price tag on each item.  I prefer to attach the tags with safety pins. Some folks prefer the tagging gun. I know that you can attach the tags much quicker with the tagging gun, but I've seen how poorly they hold up during the sale. The tags that are attached with a tagging gun get caught on other items and pulled off much more often than tags that are pinned on. With the tagging gun, the price tag is dangling loose so it easily gets caught and pulled off. When your item loses its tag your item can't be sold. To address that problem, some people use the tagging gun to attach the tag to the label inside the shirt or pants. But when the price tag is difficult for buyers to find, they just move onto the next item. Remember the buyer is standing there with full arms, often with small children distracting them and with other shoppers that keep getting in their way. You need to make it easier, not more difficult to buy your item.

Please, please don't use straight pins to attach the price tags. Yes, they are cheaper, but the straight pins will not remain neatly pinned through the tornado of the sale. If buyers get stuck by a straight pin on your item they will not want to buy it.

Next week in Conssignment Sale Prep - 102, I'll cover preparing non-clothing items for consignment. And later in Consignment Sale Prep 201, I'll explain how to prepare your items for transport to the sale.



Updated:

Check-out the rest of the series:

 

Prepping Everything	Packing Items	Loading It All Up

              Else

Buffalo Chicken Dip - Perfect for Your Super Bowl Party

What goes together better than the Super Bowl and buffalo chicken hot wings?  What's the last thing you want a bunch of hyped up football fan guests eating in your living room?

Aunt Ginny's Buffalo Chicken Dip is the perfect solution.  Yummy buffalo chicken hot wing taste without the the mess.  Oh, and did I say that it's really easy to make?

Ingredients:
2 12-oz cans chicken, drained   (I use 1 large boiled chicken breast)
8 oz. cream cheese, softened
8 oz. ranch dressing
5-10 oz. Frank's Buffalo Chicken Sauce (depending on your preferred heat level)
8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese

Mix the cream cheese and ranch dressing.  Microwave on the mixture on high for 15 second intervals (covered), mixing well between, until warm and well blended. 

Add as much hot sauce as you'd like and mix well.

If you use the canned chicken, break it up with a fork before adding it to the mixture.  I grind the boiled chicken breast in the food processor so that it's easier to scoop up in the dip (and less messy).  Mix the chicken into the mixture.

Mix the shredded cheese into the mixture.  Microwave in 30 second intervals (covered), mixing well between, until well heated and cheese has melted. 

Serve with celery sticks, tortilla chips and crackers.

The dip is just as delicious chilled.

Easy Repurposed Sweater Mittens

I am not a seamstress.  I'm  really am not a seamstress.  I am a stay-at-home mom with time on my hands, too much time, I guess.

I made this Repurposed Sweater Pillow last week as a gift for a friend. 

I loved the pink sweater so much that I just couldn't throw away the sleeves.  

Who knows when you'll need 2 beautiful pink sweater sleeves. I kept hearing  "Hoarder, hoarder, hoarder" whispered over and over again.   Luckily, only 4 days later I came up with the perfect use for the sleeves when a friend was in need of mittens and gloves for a move to a cold climate.

I had left the seam on the sleeve when I cut them off the sweater.  Since the sweater was made from wool, I washed them with a load of jeans.  I didn't really want to felt them, but I wanted the knit to tighten up some.  This seemed to work for me.

I made a pattern for the mittens by drawing around my hand.  There's a great quick video tutorial {here}.

I used a thinner fleecy sweater for my first attempt.  I laid the pattern so that the cuff is the bottom hem of the sweater ( = less sewing).  I also laid the pattern so that the non-thumb side of the mitten is the side seam of the sweater ( = even less sewing).  I told you I'm not a seamstress.

Once I cut both mittens out, I laid them on top of each other and trimmed them to the same size.  Even though I used a pattern, the mittens came out slightly different sizes because cutting through two layers of sweater can be tricky around the thumb joint area.  

I sewed them up and was so thrilled with the results that I had to make another pair.  

This time I used the binding of the cardigan (where the buttons and button holes are) to make the cuffs ( = less sewing + cute detail).  I folded the button side of the cardigan in half and cut my pattern out with the non-thumb side on the fold ( = less sewing). I did the same with the button hole side of the cardigan.  I used the extra buttons from the scraps to sew over the button holes so that both mittens match with their button detail.  My 17-year old daughter has already appropriated these.  Best compliment a mom can get.

By now I'd gained enough confidence to tackle the pink sweater, my original inspiration.  I was so excited, I forgot to take pictures.  But I laid the pattern on the sleeve so that the cuff of the sweater would be the cuff of the mitten.  And I continued my lazy ingenious step of laying the non-thumb side of the pattern on the seam of the sleeve (again, = less sewing).

I'm so happy with the way these turned out that I'm not sure I'm going to give them away.   

They're very easy to make and I made all three six of these mittens in less than an hour.  And that was with a  non-seamstress learning curve.  If you're like me, and really don't sew much, the only two things you need to know are:

1.  Use the cuff of the sweater for the cuff of your mitten.

And,

2.  Lay your pattern so the non-thumb side is on a seam or fold.

Have fun.  I'm off to thrift some more sweaters, patterned sweaters this time.  I still need to make another pair for that friend of mine 'cause the pink ones are staying with me.

 

 

Update: 

These pillows started the mitten project.

Sweater Pillows

 

 

And I made these gift bags from the sleeves of the red pillow sweater.

Sweater Sleeve Gift Bags

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Celebrate National Peanut Butter Day

January 24th is National Peanut Butter Day this year.  I absolutely love peanut butter.  Sometimes I just east a spoonful of peanut butter as a snack.  Yum.

As a peanut butter lover, I have to say that the absolute best peanut butter recipe is Auntie Charlotte's Peanut Butter Balls.  Auntie Charlotte was our neighbor when I was growing up in Hawaii.  She is not a neighbor any more, she's family.  Every Christmas she would bring over the most delicious plate of treats.  We'd politely visit and chat with her and once she left there would be a mad scramble to get to the peanut butter balls.   You may have tried peanut butter balls in the past, but until you've tried this recipe, you don't know what yummy is.

Auntie Charlotte's Peanut Butter Balls

Ingredients
1 box powdered sugar                                            1 1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup melted butter or margarine                        3 cups crushed rice krispies
12 oz. package semi-sweet chocolate chips           1/3 block paraffin

Mix powdered sugar, peanut butter and melted butter together.

Add crushed rice krispies.  (Crush the rice krispies very fine for a better texture.)

Melt chocolate chips and paraffin in a double boiler; stirring until smooth.

While the chocolate chips are melting, roll peanut butter-rice krispie mixture into 1 inch diameter balls.

Dip peanut butter balls into the chocolate.  Set on wax paper until chocolate is hardened. 

Store in refrigerator.


Enjoy! And you may want to hide a couple of extras in the far back of the fridge {just for you}.

Repurposed Sweater Valentine's Pillow

Valentine's Day should be a day that you surprise your friends with a gift.  Remember the excitement of getting Valentine's cards from your friends and classmates in elementary school?  I think we should still share that excitement with our friends now that we're just a little older.

This year I knew I wanted to make cuddly sweater pillows for a friend.  She was having a rough year and I thought that something cuddly would be just the right gift. I stopped by the thrift store and found these perfect Valentine's colored sweaters.  They were in excellent condition.  I got the pink one for only $1.50 and it's 100% wool.  Magically it's 100% soft and cuddly wool so it's perfect for a pillow.  I washed the sweaters well , Mom, so they're sweet smelling and fresh.

I took the sweaters with me to the craft store to find a pillow form that would fit each sweater.  There were two of these green pillows on sale for about 1/3 the cost of an actual pillow form.  So that was an easy decision to make.

I laid the sweater out on my cutting mat and laid the pillow on top of the sweater to measure where to cut the sweater.  I left about 1 inch extra to turn under for seams.

The pink sweater was a little shorter in length, so I had to cut the sleeves a little to be able to have enough of the body of the sweater to use.   I cut the sleeves so that the seam remained with the sleeve,    that way I can keep the sleeves for a future project without them unraveling.  The sweater was wide enough that I'd only be using the center portion of the sweater and that angled area under the arms would end up hidden in the side seams.

I sewed the seams on my sewing machine.  I sewed two seams close together to make the seams a little stronger.  Those of you who are talented seamstresses probably know a better way to do this, but it worked fine for my purposes.

I used the bottom finished edges of each sweater to make one of the seams.  The finished edges were quickly sewn shut by hand.  This allowed me to mush the pillow (a technical term) and stretch the sweater while I was sewing so that it pillow looks nice and smooth when it's finished.





The pink pillow looks much better in person.  It received 2 out of 2 teenage daughter thumbs up.  And those were unsolicited positive comments, so they mean much more.  Both of my daughter commented on how much they like the texture and pattern on the pillow.

As I was hand-sewing the red pillow shut, I had a light bulb moment. Bing.  I added a monogram for my dear friend, "C."

I took two strands of white yarn and twisted them together.  I laid the yarn out in a shape that I liked and then sewed it down with small stitches.










Now I have to look for more sweaters to surprise my daughters since they liked the pillows so much.  I have 3 weeks.  Cross your fingers for me.

Update:
I loved these sweaters so much that I made two additional easy projects from the sleeves.

Gift Bags

Sweater Mittens

Couch Potato Organizing Your Paperwork

It's January and the start of the tax prep season.  AND I have a pile of papers from before October (the official start of the busy holiday season in my house) to sort, organize and file.

Organizing and filing papers is probably my least favorite organizing job.  It's kind of like cleaning floors - I love the 2 seconds right after it's clean, shiny and organized, but after 3 seconds the mess starts again. 

To make organizing my paperwork a little more fun, I do it while watching TV.  I call it Couch Potato Organizing and convince myself that I'm watching TV ... and sorting papers.  It's more motivating than thinking of it as sorting paperwork.

First, grab your pile of papers that need to be filed and plop down in front of the TV.

Turn on your favorite show and start sorting the paper into piles for filing.

I use the following categories for our family:

Bank - a separate pile for each bank account

Credit card - a separate pile for each credit card

Insurance - home owners or renters, auto, life insurance, medical and dental insurance (you can also keep this information in separate medical and dental files, listed next)

Medical - piled chronologically (if you have family members that have on-going medical issues, you'll want to create separate piles for each person)

Dental - piled chronologically (if you have family members that have on-going dental issues, like orthodontic care, you'll want to create separate piles for each person)

Taxes - I have a file for each tax year, including the current one (filed in a prominent, easily accessible file, discussed below)

Home - Mortgage or lease information, property tax information, repair and remodeling information, inspiration ideas (because of our personal situation, I'll tell you how I handle our home(s) files in more detail below)

Auto - Loan or lease information, recalls, repairs, registration

Utilities - I keep all utilities in one folder and shred them at the end of the year

Other - any other information I file alphabetically in files as general information

I begin by sorting my big pile of To-Be-Filed papers into individual piles by category. Within each category, I sort chronologically, with the most recent on top.

Once I have all my papers sorted into individual piles, I carry them to my file drawer and file them away. Since I already have all the categories separated out, this filing goes quickly and you can easily finish it during a commercial so you wont' miss any of your show if your file cabinet isn't in your TV room. See we're really just watching TV and peripherally sorting our paperwork, so there's no need to miss your show just for some papers.

I keep my "other" category files here in our desk along with the current year's statements for banking, insurance, medical and dental. I also keep information on home and auto here. When we had a simple life (when was that again?) and only had a mortgage on the house we lived in, I kept the paperwork in this drawer. By only keeping the current year's statements in this drawer, I'm able to make sure everything I will need reference is easily accessible.

Each year I label a new brightly colored plastic file jacket with the year. We keep this jacket in the same spot on our desk and just switch out which jacket lives in that spot each year. Any receipts, statements or paperwork that we'll need when we file our taxes is stuffed carefully filed in the jacket. The plastic jacket holds up well throughout the year and with the opening on the top of the jacket, it's easy to file paperwork quickly and neatly.  When it's time to do the taxes, everything we need is right there. Everything stays neat and contained which makes tax preparation a little bit easier, and every little bit helps when it comes to taxes.

After the taxes are completed, we file the tax form along with all supporting documentation in the file jacket.  The file jacket goes into the Tax Returns file box.  It's easy to access any old tax forms or documentation since everything is right there in the file jacket for each year.  And since the jacket opens on top, it's easy to quickly thumb through all the paperwork to find what you need.

Crazy white labels are to maintain privacy of personal info.

As a military family, we move about every 3 years. Now that my children are older, living on-base doesn't always provide access to the best schools. We've chosen to live off-base for the past 11 years and 4 assignments. Thanks to the state of the economy, we're the disheartened happy owners of 2 homes that we are currently renting out AND we are tenants renting the home we live in now. That means I need to keep information on three houses, so rather than the one file I listed above, I have 2 file tubs plus 1 folder. I keep a tub on each of our houses and a folder on our current home.

Paperwork that has grown beyond a file folder is kept in file boxes in the office behind the door (since it's not as pretty as the rest of our office furniture).  I have a file box for each of our houses.   Originally I had a separate file for every category or issue pertaining to owning and renting the house.  That was too complicated.  We now keep most paperwork in a file for each year.  That makes filing taxes easier.  When we've had to find past paperwork, we can usually figure out pretty quickly what year that event occurred.  We do have separate files for renovations we've done on each room of our older house.  I highly recommend keeping paint chips for each room.  That way you can quickly find what paint you need for touch ups, even 8 year later.

I have a portable file box that I use to carry our paperwork when we move.  Currently it is holding files on the home that we're renting and a file for report cards and test scores for each of my children.  These are filed chronologically.  Keeping all the old report cards and standardized test scored has been invaluable as we move to new school districts and I have to fight with the school advocate for my children.

I have box for investment information.

I have a box for credit card statements with their receipts.  Each year I sort through those and copy any payment information I need for taxes.  I look through the receipts and pull out any we would need for insurance purposes.  Then I shred the statements and remaining receipts. 

I keep past tax returns and supporting documentation in a file box in the office.

I keep past year's bank statements in a file box in the basement.

The final step is to shred any paperwork or receipts that we don't need.  I just pull the shredder into the family room and shred during the commercials while watching my favorite show.  It's a great excuse to watch more than one show, "Sigh.  I have to watch more TV so I can finish my shredding chore.  Sigh."


To keep with my Couch Potato organizing motivation, I usually break the different areas into separate tasks that take 30-60 minutes.  I schedule the different tasks, like sorting and filing rental house papers, based on the TV shows I want to watch that evening.  That way by the end of the week, I'm caught up on my favorite TV shows AND on my filing.