As you can remember, closing month I posted approximately my sadness that I wasn't capable to participate within the Macklemore Thrift Shop Challenge issued via way of the bloggers at Young House Love due to the fact I couldn't find out some element at any of the thrift shops in my location, and my hope that the Unique Thrift Store in South Plainfield might possibly yield some better well-knownshows. Well, I am pleased to file that I did, in truth, get a hazard to check out this keep yesterday, and I did, in truth, find out some gadgets there that were buy-worthy. But earlier than I show you my haul, here's a quick bread-and-butter document on the shop itself:
First, this store is really, really big. It appears, in fact, to be two stores within a big strip mall that have had a doorway knocked into place between them. The larger section is full of clothing and some housewares items (like bedspreads, which I found hanging up on big hangers to be browsed through, like posters at an art store); the smaller section has books, a few furniture items, and some knickknacks, as well as housing the fitting rooms. The selection of clothing is bigger than that at Goodwill, and much better organized. While Goodwill groups items by color, the folks at Unique Thrift actually take the time to sort them by approximate size (small/medium/large/extra large), so instead of looking at every pair of dark pants on the rack, I only had to look at the ones in my general size group. However, I did initially waste a bit of time looking through the larges before I figured out that size 12 was filed under medium. Labeling each section with the specific range of sizes, instead of just the general descriptor, wouldn't take much effort and could save customers considerable time.
The apparel additionally appeared to be, in general, in better situation that what I've observed at smaller thrift shops. Everything end up intact, with out a stains, no tears (except the creative type that some jeans have while new), and no seen wear. Many, if not maximum, of the gadgets were within the starting from well-known manufacturers; among those I noticed on the racks were Lee, Liz Claiborne, and Express. The charges were additionally a piece better than I've visible some different region?Generally amongst $5 and $eight consistent with object. Of route, this is though lots much less than you'll pay for the same producers in a branch shop, but I did be aware that once we later popped into Shoppers' World, a reduction save in the same strip mall, it had many gadgets (together with T-shirts) that had been in reality inexpensive than those on the thrift hold. Their amazing likely wasn't as proper, however for some component that did not need to be nicely made, I'd be willing to test the Shoppers' World first?Mainly since there's one within the route people down in East Brunswick, now not some distance from a few exceptional shops we visit regularly.
This brings me to my largest hassle with Unique Thrift: the location. While it's handiest, in idea, approximately a 20-minute energy from us, a few web page visitors snarl-u.S.A.Made it closer to 1/2 of an hour, and it is half an hour in precisely the opportunity course from some thing else we would be likely to visit. (There are supposed to be a few sincerely appropriate Indian eating places up in that location, however we already have awesome ones which might be loads within the direction folks.) It's no longer a pleasant force, each, because the most direct route runs through some mainly unpleasant retail and enterprise districts, and the final vacation spot isn't always precisely pretty: a large, instead dilapidated strip mall with a massive parking zone and no empty parking regions anywhere near the shop.
Now, it might be really worth making this rather unsightly strain on a ordinary foundation if the shop clearly had some of stuff that changed into to my taste. However, despite the massive desire, I did not without a doubt discover plenty that I desired. The whole rack of medium-sized clothes did no longer have one within the style I changed into searching out (a nice, easy floral print, like the one I had years inside the past that turned into my go-to dress for weddings, parties and activities of all events, and in all likelihood nonetheless might be if I hadn't made the error of placing it in the dryer). And after looking the complete rack of medium-sized pants (and the separate rack of denims), I found simplest five pairs that looked genuinely really worth the hassle of trying on. Admittedly, it really is five pairs extra than I located at the Goodwill store, however for the reason that handiest one of the 5 pairs healthy effectively and seemed first rate, it does not seem like a totally massive payoff for the time I had to spend. (Also, it took me trips to the proper room to attempt on all 5 pairs, because the shop imposes a 3-garment restriction. Luckily I had Brian there to maintain without delay to my greater gadgets for me.) As for the books and different gadgets the shop had to provide, the choice wasn't very stunning. There had been a few board video games, but particularly for more youthful youngsters; we located not some thing more interesting than an vintage set of Scrabble Cubes, which did no longer appearance all that precise from the Perquackey game we already very very own.
So ultimately, I left the store with nice three items:
- One pair of navy slacks in a polyester/rayon blend with a hint of spandex (the "Audra" by Liz Claiborne) for $7.99. These fit comfortably and are reasonably flattering, as well as machine washable. Their only downside is that they don't have side pockets, just a dinky little patch pocket on the front that barely holds a handkerchief.
- One black single-button jacket in the same type of fabric, by Apostrophe, for $8.99. This will take the place of my non-petite-size Ann Taylor jacket from my local thrift shop, which turned out to be not much of a bargain at $2 because my local tailor wanted $85 to do the alterations on it. So it will go to a new, hopefully better home, presumably with someone taller who can wear it as is.
- A set of four paperback Nero Wolfe mysteries by Rex Stout, for $2.92. One of these, Fer-de-Lance, we'd already read, but that still worked out to less than a buck a book for the other three, which our local library doesn't have, and we can always Freecycle the extra one.
So as it turns out, I was able to carry out the main part of the Macklemore Challenge after all, putting the "20 dollas in my pocket" to good use at a thrift store. Unfortunately, I realized after we got there that I hadn't thought to bring the camera with me, so I couldn't do the other parts of the challenge: photographing myself with my $20 and photographing all the other items from the "Thrift Shop" song that I could find. Also, since I didn't bring a copy of the lyrics with me, I couldn't check to see which other items from the song's lyrics the store had—although I know I did see at least one pair of "moccasins some one else has been walkin' in."
