Car Boot Sale - any tips?

crazyhazy

We have quite a lot of stuff lying around which we no longer need and to be honest is taking up far too much space so have decided to take it to a car boot sale and hopefully make a bit of money from it. Seen a poster for one near us yesterday on the 3rd september so going to start gathering everything together and also family if they have anything for it aswell. We've never done one before though and just wondered if anyone had any tips? I was also wondering if it would be worthwhile making some birthday cards to sell, already have the materials so wouldn't cost me anything. Also, would it be worthwhile maybe making some cakes, jam etc aswell, does anyone have any experience of how well these will sell?

apprentice_tycoon

This might help

ET03

I was thinking of doing a carboot or attic sale
are they still on this late in year?
when do they stop?

brokenwings

im doing my first ever car boot on sunday
(our local one goes on till the start of october then thats it i think)
my problem is i really have no clue what to price things at
i have lots of soft toys, some clothes, hard back books and old records as well as a few household knickknack ornaments etc

is £2 per hardback reasonable ( all recent best sellers ) and offering 3 for £5?

squeaky

ET03 wrote:

I was thinking of doing a carboot or attic sale
are they still on this late in year?
when do they stop?

There ought to be some help on the car boot season here:-

ebay ( & other ) auctions.

I know it's mainly ebay topics - but other sales do get a mention now and then

apprentice_tycoon

brokenwings wrote:

im doing my first ever car boot on sunday
(our local one goes on till the start of october then thats it i think)
my problem is i really have no clue what to price things at
i have lots of soft toys, some clothes, hard back books and old records as well as a few household knickknack ornaments etc

is £2 per hardback reasonable ( all recent best sellers ) and offering 3 for £5?

I'm ooop north and I would expect a good quality hardback for around £1 to £1.50 with paperbacks at less than 50 pence.
If you really don't have a clue about prices I wouldn't mark them up because if you are really wide of the mark people will see them and just walk past. If you play it by ear and name your price when asked you can gauge reaction as you go and adjust them downwards if need be

ET03

so should car boot questions be in this forum or in the e-bay forum then ?

squeaky

They should really be in the ebay forum

Various sales and auction type threads arose here through means of raising some pin money (which is OS) but questions directly relating to a sale or auction should really be asked in the ebay ( & other ) auctions forums.

At the end of the day - good as all our Old Stylers are - there are still lots of regular readers on those forums who will be able to add their own knowledge and experience to your answers. I pointed there because I honestly believe there's plenty of good advice to be had from the board which, after all, was set up for the purpose. See?

Maisie

Take a long table and make it look neat if you can. Always attracts buyers.
Take a chair to sit on and an umbrella. For rain or sun. Take plenty of change and carrier bags. Food and drinks too.

Small cakes seem to sell to children. I've seen jam for sale about £1.50 a pot but eventually sold for £1.

Lots of sellers have plums from their gardens and apples etc. Plums were 80p a pound and advertised as organic! I thought 80p a bit OTT but she was selling them.

Try to make things look as clean as possible and polish shoes etc. All adds to the price you can ask.

Chat to the buyers and be friendly. They might come back for something else if you are.

If you have stuff left over and don't want to take it home ask a regular stall owner if they want to buy the lot from you. Or take it to the charity shop next day.

Good luck and fine weather. That helps most of all.

tom_and_barbara_good

squeaky wrote:

They should really be in the ebay forum

Various sales and auction type threads arose here through means of raising some pin money (which is OS) but questions directly relating to a sale or auction should really be asked in the ebay ( & other ) auctions forums.

At the end of the day - good as all our Old Stylers are - there are still lots of regular readers on those forums who will be able to add their own knowledge and experience to your answers. I pointed there because I honestly believe there's plenty of good advice to be had from the board which, after all, was set up for the purpose. See?

I can see how car boot sales might be thought to suit the ebay forum but the actual title of that board is 'ebay (and other other auctions) board' so I just took that to mean on-line auction sales, as do most of the users seemingly.

I think that standing in a cold field at 6 in the morning to sell your wares and haggle is about as 'old style' as it could ever get....it's practically Biblical!

VickyA_2

tom_and_barbara_good wrote:

I think that standing in a cold field at 6 in the morning to sell your wares and haggle is about as 'old style' as it could ever get....it's practically Biblical!

:rotfl:

So true! Even when we did a car boot sale a couple of weeks ago I was wrapped up in a fleece to start off with. And trying to persuade someone that your high quality items that you no longer want are actually nice (like the third un-used chocolate fondue set that we managed to get rid of!).

Oh, tip for car booters - make sure that the people who gave you the items on your stall (as presents!) aren't wandering around the boot sale. I recognised something on a friend's stall that was a present from a mutual friend last Christmas. Friend looked highly embarassed that I recognised it, but not realising that I'd sold a present that they'd given me a couple of weeks earlier.

Paperback books I couldn't sell for more than 20p, unless they were in un-read condition, in which case 50p. Recipe books went for 50p.