On a workday morning in Southern California, treasure hunting starts in a cavernous Goodwill Outlet. Shoppers rummage elbow-deep into blue spinning barrels, gloved hands sorting through mountains of clothes, shoes, and miscellany.
It appears haphazard, nearly a gold rush, only the “gold” is used merchandise sorted by pound.
One produced a broken belt. Another hauled up a lone flip-flop. And then, lost in the wreckage, came something unexpected: a real Missoni shawl that once sold for $350.
That shawl sold for less than two dollars. Eventually, it was sold online once again for $62. It was far from a lot of money, yet it begat a side venture that would nearly reach a profit of $9,000 in a year.
A clearing binge became a business opportunity
The shawl fliperateur did not wake up one morning hoping to create an empire. She sold an item on Poshmark, a resale app that gained popularity exponentially in the last decade, in February 2024. She simply began to clear out. She explained,
“I looked around my house at all the stuff we’d accumulated, especially after having kids, and made a pile of things I wasn’t using but couldn’t quite let go of, until that moment, when they finally had a new purpose.”
Into a bin went a maternity dress that once appeared at a wedding, baby T-shirts that still bore price tags, and a set of handmade mugs.
That first purge fitted into three trash bags. She took it all online to her Poshmark closet, Forsythe Canyon. When sales began coming in, she saw this could be something more than a means of clearing closet space.
By summer, she frequented “The Bins,” as resellers refer to the Goodwill Outlet regularly to find merchandise to resell and profit from.
During the year, she sold 784 items from listings and sold 474 of those items to make a revenue of $14,000 and took away $8,700 of profit after expenditures.
A buddy’s inspiration
The thought of reselling was not entirely foreign. Her closest buddy spent a decade thrifting. When that buddy found Poshmark, part-time thrifting became a part-time income. Witnessing that transformation piqued curiosity.
But it really sealed the deal when she found the online reseller community on Instagram.
“Out of everything, what surprised me most was how collaborative reselling is,” she explained. “It didn’t feel cutthroat whatsoever. I’d promote other resellers’ Poshmark stores on Instagram, and they would support me back.“
Veteran sellers warned her to start by reselling from existing inventory before tapping into new merchandise. She did that and made a profit.
She ended up mid-stream in the Instagram resell business, learning how to look up “sell-through rates,” keep an eye on average sales prices, and spot deals on live auctions like Whatnot.
Others’ experiences revealed how much people appreciate reselling. A friend paid for all of her college tuition. Another treated it as additional income to use on family trips. Another seller made it a living when she could not fit into office life through regular employment.
Hard lessons in house-flipping
Nevertheless, reselling didn’t come without hitches. At first, she confesses to committing newbie errors.
“I overpaid for trendy items I didn’t bother to ‘comp’ (reseller speak for checking comparable sales), and ended up losing money on a few pieces I thought were “cute,‘“ she explained,
Bookkeeping was another headache. Everything initially coexisted in disorderly spreadsheets. She later moved to Vendoo, reseller-optimized software that made it easy to keep sales information organized, monitor profit margins, and discover which brands sold most effectively.
Photography proved to be a learning experience as well. “When I look back at some of my early listing photos, I’m shocked that anything sold. There were too many shots with bad lighting, jeans half-out-of-frame, and wrinkled tops,” she chuckled.
Poor lighting, wrinkled attire, and off-center composition nearly doomed her business. Now, her dining table is a photo studio of sorts, covered in an inexpensive sheet and lit by lamps plundered from the bedroom.
“Average sales of hers ran into the mid-30s. Not showy, but predictable.That Missoni shawl was a lucky flip. My average sale price per item lands closer to $30, but that adds up,” she said.
The rhythm of the hustle
A day in her life is a far cry from something you would see from a “business owner.” She compared it to a treasure hunt, a life of family, and marathon evening listings.
When the kids are at school, she’ll swing by the Outlet, spend $100, and transform it into $600 worth of inventory. In the evenings, she props up a TV show in the background and lists up to 20 items at a time.
The activity is work-intensive. Each piece must be photographed, measured, keyworded in descriptions, and followed. Eventually, all of this bending and styling makes her back hurt.
“If I tracked my hours, I’m pretty sure I’m earning less than minimum wage,” she agreed. “But it is flexible.”
Not everything is about money
Reselling is not glamorous. It is no quick cash. But to her, the reward is more than financial.
She gets into specifics about how to make things new again. Such as when she sold a pair of vintage 1950s suede kitten heels that she bought for $16.
A Palm Springs customer wore those as part of the focal point of her bachelorette party dress attire. “That was my best flip,” she said. “It wasn’t about money, it was about preventing something beautiful from ending up in a landfill.”
For her, resale is a matter of business, creativity, and community. Discovery is how it compels her to persevere even when it is laborious work.
A growing community
The resell universe just keeps growing. At any Goodwill Outlet location, new carts come out every 10 minutes loaded to capacity with goods that once inhabited someone’s house. To most people, it is garbage. To resellers, it is untapped potential.
The market is far from drying up any time soon. Americans are giving, getting smaller, and getting rid of items at all-time highs. That translates to a virtually unlimited supply of inventory and new sellers entering our community every day.
However, a year later, she is no longer considering herself as an expert. She continues to learn, refine her own process, and experiment on new platforms. But she discovered something she did not anticipate: joy.
“It started as me getting rid of things from my own house and it ended up being so much more,” she said. “You sometimes find treasure. Sometimes you find people. You hit the jackpot if you find both.”
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