$ Thrifting - treasure hunting in the modern world

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A friend of mine buys shirts/smart clothes from British Heart Foundation, Salvation Army and Exodus charity shops, even if they don't him. He then takes them to a local tailor who has done a fair bit of fixing for him, so he gets good rates.

He can pick up a full suit + tailoring for under £50.

It's rare to find here in England as I think most people are savvy to it, but I once got a full stack Sony Hi-fi+speakers and cables in near mint condition for £70. Could have flipped it for £350 but fuck that, it's a quality piece of kit.
 
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Bog-standard Poster said:
A friend of mine buys shirts/smart clothes from British Heart Foundation, Salvation Army and Exodus charity shops, even if they don't him. He then takes them to a local tailor who has done a fair bit of fixing for him, so he gets good rates.

He can pick up a full suit + tailoring for under £50.
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That's a good idea, I usually don't bother with tailored clothes because they never fit right, never thought of getting them fixed professionally. I can sew a little bit, so if I find clothes too big for me I can adjust them or if it's real deathfat size and in a nice fabric, I can cut it up for cheap fabric supplies for other sewing projects.
There's a lot of "thrift flip" or "upcycling" sewing channels on TikTok and YouTube that show the process, some of them sell their own upcycled work or give you ideas for what to do with different items you find.
 
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Total flipper death. All my decent thrift shops are picked over to the point there are massive gaps on the shelves. I used to buy my cookware at goodwill, that's done, they've got a fucking MANUAL on pricing cookware, so the only stuff left for people actually buying for themselves is scraped to hell.

Goodwill is flat out putting broken shit on the shelf now, and they just say "Yeah, we know".

I got my latest pair of shoes at goodwill, it was about $30 lower than retail, but the dude literally put it on the shelf as I was walking by.
 
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I picked up 5 cds at a thrift store today. Classic music like Dvorak and Hayden. They were produced in West Germany. There must have been a very narrow window of time before the Berlin Wall came down they were pressing CDs.

Now I'm not a hardcore audiophile, but older discs have high quality audio due to the recording method and lack of compression prior to stamping.
 
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8mm Cunningham said:
I bought some Dickie cargo shorts today at Walmart for $14. Non-deathfat sizes always go on sale at the end of the season. I also buy all my sunscreen and bug spray at this time of the year.
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Fortunately or unfortunately Walmart doesn't sell 5.11s so I'm SOL there.
 
I'll be honest, I despise Goodwill. They get their inventory for free, their employees often make below minimum wage and they pay no taxes. On top of it all they've long stopped serving the needs of poor people, except perhaps for clothes.

Thankfully, there's at least one good local-based alternative where I live.
 
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You can still find good stuff at thrif stores and even Goodwill but you gotta go all the time. I stop by them everytime I drive past one. I got Mario Kart Wii & Wii Sports Resort for $3.99 each yesterday.
 
I can only speak for my experience in England here, but if you want the best bargains, find a charity shop in or near a posh local area. A lefty fart-huffing posh are is best. They send their clothes to the charity shops who usually have standarised pricing for clothes. I picked up an Yves St Lauren ladies coat (for a family member) for £5. Even if it wasn't a label brand, £5 is a steal.

Don't just hunt in charity shops either. Small 'outlet' shops (not the ones on big retail parks) can have great clothes in them. I've picked up mountain walking-quality coats and jackets for 1/10th of the shelf price.
 
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whatever I feel like said:
I'll be honest, I despise Goodwill. They get their inventory for free, their employees often make below minimum wage and they pay no taxes.
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For years I used to donate old shit until some hag chewed me out because something wasn't left in the right kind of bag in the precise location on the stoop where donations go. Fuck off cunt, I was doing this because I'd rather not be wasteful but not anymore.
 
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I bought a few cool stuff from thrifting, ranging from Genesis Games, a full blown projector, modded PS2, etc.
But the treasure I'm the proudest of is a 70's Toshiba pocket calculator with a 8-digit blue fluorescent vacuum display, which cost me 50 cents.
Nothing noteworthy, but I just love its display.
 
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Asian tech support said:
For years I used to donate old shit until some hag chewed me out because something wasn't left in the right kind of bag in the precise location on the stoop where donations go. Fuck off cunt, I was doing this because I'd rather not be wasteful but not anymore.
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Find a local charity-owned one instead, like somewhere that gives clothes to those in need. That's what we do when we can. Barring that, Salvation Army or Habitat for Humanity Restore would gladly take stuff.
Speaking of Habitat, Restore locations are fantastic, in my opinion. All the ones I've been to have been staffed by friendly people and they usually have some really neat stuff, ESPECIALLY if you hit one near a nicer area. There's one near where my husband works in a better spot of town, and while there's some lesser stuff that comes through, a lot of pretty nice stuff is the majority.

I go each week, and I've gotten paintings/art, furniture, office supplies (got a $30+ shredder for $12!), and they even have a little book shop and coffee bar attached that is better than any Starbucks you'll go to. They regularly have nicer furniture too - saw some faux leather couches recently that were in fantastic shape and less than $300, and they reclined! Sadly didn't have the room or the money for it, cause we need new couches. Best find so far was a leather wingback chair with brass studwork; it has a seat that goes down a bit in the back when you sit in it, and it feels like it's giving you a hug. :) $160~ for something that would be well over $700 new nowadays! Also got a cute marble side table for $30. Definitely would be over $100 new.

I have found a few neat pieces at Goodwill too, like a "throne" that has some storage in the seat and some hooks to hold things high up on the back. Sort of like an umbrella tree, but a throne instead. $50~. But that's a little rarer, Goodwill gets more foot traffic I think so the good shit gets grabbed up faster.
 
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Contra Pozz said:
This is all nonsense for several reasons
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it's not compression like MP3 compression but dynamic range compression or some shit - there's details on it somewhere but apparently modern music is mastered like shit

and you can tell a lot about an area by what clothes ends up clearanced at walmart; only move to areas where the clearance clothes are all XXL+
 
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I just found Titus Seasons 1 and 2 on DVD at a thrift store for 8 bucks. I checked Ebay to see if Season 3 was on there and someone was selling it for 250 bucks wtf.
 
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