What's in Mazda?

Happy Easter, Everyone!

I  hope the Bunny left you some nice surprises.  He doesn't spend a lot of time at our house. I think Chiquito intimidates him a little, but I don't mind that so much right now.

That's because I got a good Mazda shot yesterday.  Take a look.  Every sale was right in our neighborhood, too.

 Any grocery bags you see peeking about in there don't count.  They just have groceries in them.  How boring is that?

Aside from that, what do you see in Mazda?

Monday Rambles

Well, it finally happened.  I do feel sorry for them.  It's tough to make it so far and then have it all snatched away.  It also came too late to have any effect on sales here.  Oh well.  It's also now Spring Break, which is traditionally another lull, with the Derby Festival waiting to start up on the 18th.  April is a cruel month. Also, a stormy one.  We're gonna be covered in the proverbial May flowers if this keeps up!

The first few days of the month were a little down, as far as daily sales go, but Saturday was the Spring Fling at the mall and I had a killer day.  I thought I was going to sell a table that needs to go, but the people that kept looking at it and talking about it bought a gun cabinet from someone else instead.  I guess you can eat cross legged on the floor, just as long as the shotgun is secure.  Or something.  I did sell a nice shelf and a ton of comics, so it was still a really good day.

Speaking of Saturday, it was a long day.  It had POURED rain CONSTANTLY at the end of last week, so the thrifting I wanted to do did not get done.  I added that to the yard sale list, which already included a stop at an antique mall (for a booth that was running a 75% off sale) and the comic shop (for 25 and 50 cent movie special sale).  Add the drop off at the mall to that, and it was after 8 before we got home.  It did make for a nice Mazda shot yesterday.

Speaking of which here's the big stuff from the haul.

Both these came from the first stop.  The seller kept calling us "early birds" but we were there after his posted starting time.  I think he meant that we were the first ones there.  He was in "make an offer and I'll probably take it mode."  I ended up getting a few things from him.  School desks are my kryptonite.  Simply cannot resist them, even when I already have a couple in storage.  Keith said "Eddie's gonna buy a school desk." as soon as we pulled up and saw it.  More on those chairs in a minute.

Little Tikes is a must buy for me, when I can find it in good enough shape and cheaply enough.  So many people come through the mall looking for good kid's toys with a lot of life left in them.  At the sale where I got this, a little boy of about six was in charge of selling the toys, with some hints from his mother.  I asked how much it was and he said "Three dollars."  His mother tried to tell him that I might want to make an offer on it, when I opened it up and found all kinds of play food inside.  He said:  "Okay.  The food is a dollar and the grill is two dollars.  That makes three dollars."  I had to buy it.

When I gave him the money, he said "Now I have 18 dollars!"  As we were leaving, his mother was trying to get him to sell all the toys that were left to this one girl for two dollars.  He looked the the girl, pointed to a box of stuffed animals and said:  "For two dollars you can have two of these and all of these toys here on the ground."  We were all cracking up.

These were from the 75% off antique booth.  I got them for a really awesome price.  Kid's chairs are almost as bad for me as school desks, at least when they're this cute.  The paint on the one on the left is the most interesting gold-ish color.  Very intriguing.

Finally, a few "bigger smalls."  I'll get to the best of the rest of the smalls tomorrow.  The canister set came from the first sale.  I also got set of square glass containers with wood lids from him as well.  The UK poster was my attempt at "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em."  It's an older design for the wildcats.  The little square planter sold right after I put it out.  A woman was buying it while I was getting checked out and the mall was closing.  The bamboo-looking tray on the bottom still had its original retail price tag on it ($49.99!--EEK!).  That white piece of paper is my sales paperwork from March.  I got my check while I was there. 

I start my new treatments tomorrow.  I have to say again how thankful I am for all of the support that's been shown here on the blog, on Facebook, and in person.  It really helps.  There's nothing to do but keep going and hope this one takes.

It's supposed to rain all week here.  We're still under flood watches from all the rain last week, so I hope we don't float away.  At least it'll be nice on Saturday for the big community sale in our neighborhood and the MAJOR church sale across town.  I guess I'll be staying in and catching up on some reading.  Might be good to take it easy the first week of treatment.  Although, there is the lure of the 50% off Easter candy....

I do hope everyone had nice Easter and that the bunny was good to you.  It's odd to have Easter so early this year.  Now, I guess, it's onward into SPRING!

See ya!

Display's the Thing

My Easter display:

I know.  Not very inspiring.  I have absolutely no talent for these things.  The best I can do is make sure that things look like they're supposed to be placed together, that this placement has been done deliberately.  For the talentless (like me), this is often quite sufficient.

In the kinds of places where I tend to sell, Easter is not a big merch holiday.  The same for Valentines Day, Independence Day, etc.  Except for a few vendors who buy new goods from wholesalers, you just don't see whole booths done over for these holidays, unlike the big deals that folks do for Christmas and Halloween (the biggies).  The most I've ever done for any of those holidays is a table of stuff.  Usually, just a shelf or two will do.

This is where deliberateness of placement comes into play.  Over the years I've seen a lot of booths where the vendor has taken a small handful of items for a particular holiday, tossed them on a shelf, and there they sit, six months later. 

You know what I'm talking about here.  The jack-o-lantern you see in May.  Or the two boxes of Christmas cards that are still sitting on the same shelf month after month after month.  Sometimes you even see the Easter basket with the box of Valentine cards in it (in August)!  These items typically don't sell because they get tossed in with everything else in the booth and don't stand out in the least bit.  They look and feel almost like afterthoughts.  Sitting there all these weeks after their intended holiday, they make a booth look dated and stale.

It's not always necessary to make a special shelf or table for things, however.  I've seen plenty of vendors with a real talent for styling and displays in their booths who can slip a couple of bunnies or wreaths in and make it work.  These items seem to both fit in with everything and stand out at the same time.  And they sell quickly.  I'm always a little jealous of these skilled vendors, even as I admire their work.

It's folks like me who need to use the element of deliberateness to make their seasonal wares sell.  A nice grouping of items doesn't need to be large to stand out and sell.  It's the thought that goes into it that's the key.

Of course, no matter what path a vendor follows with seasonal/timely items, they need to be removed as soon as possible after their time has passed.  I know there are booths here and there that sell nothing but Christmas (and even a few that do Halloween) all year long, but that's different from what I'm talking about.  Folks like me need to look fresh and create an impression that their spaces are updated frequently who need to watch how long certain items sit around.  You'd be surprised how many people never take their holiday items out.

I should have had this one for Easter...

I love the artwork in this kids' book I found at a church sale.  It is highly stylized and highly dramatic.

There's something about those heads turned at such odd angles looking straight up like that.