Lesson Learned: Clothing Sale Follow Up

Last month I wrote about all of the time and effort I had been putting into preparing for an upcoming local mom to mom sale.

I had such high hopes for the sale! I had everything organized, labelled, categorized by size and even hung up on racks for display.

The clothes I was selling were in great condition, some still had the original tags on! I figured if I priced them low (I’m talking a $30 winter jacket, tags on for $8) I should come home with a profit and a lot less baby clothing, right? Wrong.

I arrived to the sale only to find that my booth would be located in room two. Red flags went up right away. Not only had I had to pay a premium price because of entering late as a vendor, but to put it in perspective, when I shopped at the sale last year I never even knew about the second room. So now I had paid more money, for less traffic.

True, the organizers posted a sign pointing out ‘more shopping upstairs’ but I think room two was an afterthought for many shoppers.

I did see a bit of traffic but despite thinking my prices were fair, I was bartered down on many items.

After a 60 minute setup, three hours of selling and 60 minutes to clean up I hadn’t even broke even. It had cost me more to enter the sale as a vendor than I had walked away with!

Lesson learned. The sale is great for buyers. I’ve had a wonderful experience and purchased many items for a great price as a shopper in the past, but as a vendor, I think I’ll just take this as a learning experience and stick to selling my stuff through my online mommy groups.