I do thrift store flipping in my spare time. What this means is, I purchase items at thrift stores, clean them up and repair them and re-sell them online on Poshmark and Mercari and occasionally eBay.
At the time of writing this, we are in the midst of the California Covid-19 Quarantine. Since the majority of the world is also under quarantine, we’re obviously not purchasing unnecessary items right now. Sales are dead! That’s OK. We need to have hope that we’ll get through these times and come out OK and better than ever. There are a few things you can be doing with all of your extra time at home that will give you a head start when the business starts up again.
List the Dead Pile
If you flip clothes or other items you most likely have what we in the community like to call, “The Dead Pile”. The dead pile is that pile of clothing on the spare room bed that gets larger and larger as you source more than you can possibly list. Now is the best time to steam, photograph and get through that dead pile. When you do get back to selling, you’ll have more listing than ever and more room on the spare room bed to build another dead pile.
Re-Take, Refresh and Re-list
Go through your older listings that haven’t sold and refresh them. Pull out a bulk lot of your listings and set them up to take better photos in better lighting. Refresh the listings by re-listing them entirely and deleting old listings. In most sites like Poshmark and Mercari, it re-listing your items will bring them to the top of the new items and bring new views from new buyers.
Update Keywords
Keywords are important. When you’re in super selling mode, it’s often hard to find time to look up the appropriate keywords and add them to each listing. Fortunately, when business is slow, it’s so much easier to go through each of your listings and find the right keywords and add them. Using the right keywords will bring you up in both Google search and the selling site search engines more frequently. For more information on using Keywords, I recommend Keyword Research Like a Pro which is totally free on Kindle Unlimited.
Organize your Inventory
Now that you’ve listed, refreshed, taken pictures, etc… It’s time to organize. If you’ve been waiting for “time” to organize all of that inventory, now you have it! I took all of my goods off the beds, chairs, shelves, and closets it was in and organized it all, created inventory numbers and developed a better shipping process. Now when sales start up again, I’ll be ready! Here is a great video on how to organize your Poshmark inventory.
Catch up on the Books
Last of all, you’ll want to update your accounting system. Even if you’re only re-selling as a hobby, you do need to report your income to the IRS and you’ll definitely want to track costs to make sure you’re making a profit. Here’s a video on how to keep your books for reselling:
Above all, have hope! Stay safe and we will get through this quarantine together! But separately of course. 😉