rachelteodoro
Trash to Travel Challenge: What I Learned in a Month of Reselling to Create a Travel Budget From Nothing
I started this trash to travel challenge on a whim. Any time I post about reselling {often in my Instagram stories}, I always get questions about how I do it. A quick response to someone who dropped into my DM's, had my mind spinning, and the challenge was created. You see, when I started reselling items about 25 years ago, there weren't many platforms out there. You were often limited to reselling by having a garage sale, and while I love going to them, I don't always like having them! Things have changed so much, and nearly everyone has access to reselling their items for a profit, they just need that little push. As I've shared my experience during my trash to travel challenge, I have heard from many people that I have given them the push that they needed to start listing. After 31 days challenging myself to resell items and create a travel budget from nothing, I learned a few things too. Yes, even with decades of experience, I took away a few nuggets. Are you ready to see what they were?
Trash to Travel Challenge: What I Learned in a Month of Reselling to Create a Travel Budget From Nothing
When I started reselling items, I was as a young mom with small children. We were living on one income since I was a stay-at-home mom and I was looking for ways to squeeze out any extra cash in our budget. I'd often buy used kids toys, gear and clothes at garage sales, got some use out of them, and then flip them and make a profit.
I shared how I saved money on clothes for our whole family back in this post from 2013. I just reread it, and it really does break down how I was able to clothe our family of five on a $100/per person annual budget. In case you were curious, the average household in America actually budgets about $1500/per person annually!
I enjoy the hunt at a garage sale or thrift shop and now that I no longer need to do it out of necessity {you guys, we were broke!}, I still enjoy making money from nothing.
I always say that reselling helps to support my thrifting habit, since I almost always buy one thing I can resell on every trip that will cover the cost of my visit, but I also found that it can help me do other things, like create a fun money fund for travel!
I love to travel! My younger brother recently passed away unexpectedly. He was only 42. It just solidified what I know to be true, that life is too short to wait to take the trip! So travel budget it is. I hear from people all the time that they wish they could travel more. Well friends, simple challenges like this can help you do just that!
But, you could also want to free up some money to pay down some bills, or to be able to set money aside for a budget to help supplement your family income the way that I used to.
Here are a few things that I learned as a seasoned reseller after 31 days of this trash to travel challenge.
Know the Reselling Platforms
I thought I knew my platforms, but honestly, I just had gotten comfortable on them. Facebook Marketplace is probably the easiest for me and honestly, my favorite. I don't mind meeting people in person to sell my items {choose a meeting location nearby-I know the Ace Hardware address by heart!}, which means, I don't lose any money for selling fees.
Facebook Marketplace is great for furniture as well. Shipping can be a pain, and while I know there are people who will happily wrap a pallet for shipping, that's just not me!
Pro Tip for Reselling on Marketplace
Join the groups! Anytime you list an item for sale on Marketplace, it shows up in your feed and gets shown to your friends. There is a toggle selection that will allow you to "hide from friends" but then if you toggle that, you can't list it in more places. Your key to selling on Marketplace is to list it in more places.
Join the targeted groups to get a niche audience for your items. For instance, I resell a lot of Lululemon, so I have a few Lululemon groups that I'm part of. Once you list your item on Marketplace, you can then check the box that will allow you to also publish your listing in those groups. This is incredibly helpful if you are ok meeting in person. I have about 10 nearby groups based on location that I list my items in that allows my listings to be more targeted to an area.
I realized early on in the month that many of my listings were just falling flat. Once I turned off the "hide from friends" toggle and started listing in those groups, my sales skyrocketed!
Poshmark increased their fees and so I increased my prices. My items there are slower to move.
I used to be well versed in reselling on eBay, but things have changed. I sold some vintage perfume at the end of last year, and someone had buyers remorse and requested a refund, which I clearly said I didn't offer. Well, then they opened a file against me for dispute, which I gladly accepted because I was NOT in the wrong...except by eBay standards. The customer gets all the protection. I feel like after that case was opened against me, my views on the items has gone way down. So I really am very selective about my listings on eBay, keeping it only to collectible items, since there seem to be so many more buyers on that platform for those.
While standing at the Goodwill Outlet waiting for the bins to be pulled out, I overheard a reseller talking to another reseller about Depop. My 23-year-old daughter has sold on Depop, but I didn't think it was for me. It's got a MUCH younger audience, but I did have some items that I thought might do well there, and the fact that they don't have any selling fees made me think that I had nothing to lose.
This old dog learned some new tricks! I joined Depop the final half of my challenge, and made more than 10 sales in a week. Items that I had previously had listed on Poshmark or Marketplace and weren't getting any traction, sold nearly as quickly as they were listed!
All that to say, get to know the platforms. See what is selling {not just what is listed} and list your items accordingly.
Pro tip: Don't be afraid to cross post your items! It barely takes any extra time to copy and paste your listing from one reselling app to the other. Just remember that if your item sells, you need to remove it from the other platform so you don't resell your item more than once!
Listing Items Consistently Matters!
The algorithm seems like such a buzzword we all just throw into any conversation about the internet these days, but there's something to it, even in the reselling market! I started posting my items on reselling platforms almost every single day. Sometimes it would just be two or three items, other times I'd list dozens. It doesn't seem to make a difference how many you list, but having consistency in listing, seems to make a difference.
I found this to be true especially with Poshmark. In fact, Poshmark sends out listing streaks and "prizes" to people who are active on their platform. I did notice more sales on Poshmark this month because I was more active on that particular platform.
On Marketplace, make sure you are going to your sellers platform and seeing if there are any listings that you need to delete and relist or renew. It's dumb that you have to do that, but it does help get your items into people's feed again.
The Profit is in the Purchase
I feel like this was my daily mantra, especially as I got DM's from people asking for my secrets. This is the biggest one! I have very high profit margins because I don't start off spending a lot of money. I know there are people out there who make a living sourcing items from their local thrift stores, but on average, every clothing item at my local thrift store is around $14.99. There isn't a lot of profit for me.
As a reminder, the Goodwill Outlet charges by the pound. The price has increased, and items {like very desirable Carhartt's} can be heavy. On average, every item I buy at the "bins" costs me around $1.50. I don't tend to buy items that won't return me at least $20/item. I prefer higher, but that's my threshold.
You'd be shocked to know that my social media feed is now full of resellers accounts, so I watch those videos of people sourcing at local stores. I realize that you can "invest" a few hundred dollars in an item, and resell it for much more, making much higher profits than I do, BUT then you are also tying up a lot of money in inventory. I'm going to stick with my $1 items for now. Maybe one day I'll get more bold.
Google Image is Your Friend!
I joined a Poshmark resellers group to talk about pain points and tips for reselling. At least that's why I thought I joined. What the group mostly is, is people who think they want to resell, but don't have a clue where to start. Friends, Google Image is your best friend. I literally stand at a garage sale, or at the bins and snap a photo of the item I find and in seconds, I can usually find recently sold prices on that specific item to see if it's worth me grabbing or not. It also helps me know what the items is selling for across the platforms, so I know how to price an item.
If you don't have Google Image downloaded to your phone, do it now! It is so easy to use and will really help you know if something is worth buying or not.
Buy What You Know
When my oldest son was in high school, he started a reselling business with a few friends. They were incredibly profitable. One of the very first things I told him when we were out garage saleing one weekend was to buy what you know. I have a good reselling friend and I'm always shocked at what she finds at the bins to resell. She's got a real knack for weird stuff. I don't have that same knack, but I do know other things.
When my kids were little and I was reselling, I knew a lot about kid stuff. I was very good at knowing what those top brands were and what items had a lot of value. Heck, I don't think I lost the touch because I bought a kids bike during this challenge for $10 at Value Village and within three hours made a $65 profit!
All that to say, buy what you know. If you know a lot about musical instruments, buy those. If you know a lot about vintage Christmas buy that. For me, it's high-quality furniture. That always turns the best profit for me. You will rarely lose if you buy what you know!
Don't be Greedy!
Of course, you always want to make the most money that you can, but you have to remember that you can't be greedy! The people set the market, and if you get an offer, seriously consider it. Because my profit margins are so high, I almost always allow myself a fair amount of wiggle room.
In the past, I've lost quite a few sales by wanting to make more money. I have learned that the market sets the price, and sometimes items aren't selling for what they were at one time for whatever reason. I would rather make the sale and take the money.
For this challenge, I was thinking of everything based on travel. I took some time to accept a sale, and then thought about it for a minute. I realized that the $20 profit would cover my lunch one day on my trash to travel adventure, so I accepted it. The difference in price was only a few dollars, and I'm glad I ultimately had the sale and didn't just have the item still sitting there.
The Results
If you made it this far, are you curious to see how much I was able to make in one month {March 1-31} during my trash to travel challenge?
Some days I had a lot of sales, some days it would be dry like the Sahara. I sold 50 items in the month of March for a total profit of $2,223.07! That's about $45 profit per item. That's a pretty decent travel budget!
And here's the thing, not everything I listed during the challenge has sold. Those profits are just what sold during those 31 days. I'll continue to make money long after this challenge is over. {breaking news...I just had a sale and had to update my numbers to reflect that! Bring it on!}
Know what else I'll continue to do? I'm going to keep reselling! I love the hunt and this challenge forced me to list items that I had waiting to list, but since that's my least favorite part, I would put it off! Like all things, I found that listing wasn't that bad, and hopefully I'll stay motivated to continue to list and not just buy!
And one other thing, my husband will hate this, BUT, I am going to continue to buy furniture. Mike hates storing furniture, but it's what I know and the profit is good for me, so I'm going to be flipping more furniture in the next few months hopefully.
Now for the fun part, I'm going to figure out where I'm going to go on my little trash to travel vacation! I have a decent little budget for myself.
Friends, remember, reselling can be a nice little side hustle. You don't have to go out to thrift stores like I do, start with what you know and what you have in your home or in your closet. You'd be shocked to know how much extra cash you have just lying around!
I hope this challenge inspired and motivated you! Happy reselling!
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