Selling Clothes Consignment

I have taken my daughter's clothes to Once Upon a Child. You may want to call first to see what they need. They only have a certain amount of space and when they are full, they won't take anymore. You will make good money on the stuff you take though. I buy brand new winter coats for my daughter each year at Sears, JCPenney, Target, etc. because they are cheaper than the ones at Once Upon a Child. Because they sell at such high prices, they are able to pay you a large amount for the items you donate.

I have never done the consignment, but a friend did and said she made a couple hundred doing so. If you have party dresses, I would post them online around the holidays. I just posted some costumes on Craigslist and received a couple of calls, so they will call. Take well lit photos if that is what you are going to do.

consignment shops tend to take higher percentage. I have done consignment sales, usually help 1-3 times per year and you get more of the money esp if you volunteer to work the sales as well.
consignmentmommies.com will give you local sales to check out.

I've done the consignment thing and it worked okay cause it's little work and you get the cash when you want it.

But you would make more selling them on ebay in groupings of a couple outfits at a time or a few shirts together or throw in a pair of shoes.

But both of those options...you have to sell the clothes that are in season. My consignment shop won't take things that aren't in season.

I had HUGE success with a garage sale. Girl's clothes especially sell good. I priced my clothes the same as the consignment shop and people payed those prices cause they were good quality clothes from name brand places. Also, I spread the word through craigslist and facebook, and I had lots of friends of friends come cause they new what size clothing would be there and some of them spent $50-$100 at a time.

I know it's a lot of work but once it's all together, you could run the garage sale at two or three different times & locations throughout the summer.

If you're not up for that, I would definitely put the time into ebaying:)

I think that the easiest option anymore is to donate either to a family you know that will put your stuff to good use (and hopefully find someone to donate to you, so its all in good karma/pay it forward sort of thing), or donate to charity and take the tax deduction. I'm SWIMMING in handmedowns right now. I was told that Once Upon a Child is an easy option. I just returned from there this weekend (Chicago location, I've been a few times before) and the women there are very quippy, like they can't get you in/out fast enough, the store is always packed to the gills (doesn't make for an easy shopping experience when I'm trying to bargain hunt) and they just claimed that they were *way* over stocked. When I went back through what they did not take (they took an extremely small fraction of what I brought in), I was really surprised. A lot of it was my "better" stuff. So if they don't take the clothing that is in near-mint condition (some of which still had tags on), and in season - its just ridiculous. I spend way more time getting everything ready and hauling it over there and back to have it feel like i'm actually getting something out of it. True consignment shops tend to be even a slice more upscale and want name-brand-only, extremely perfect condition, outfits and sets, etc. And then you have to deal with when they have scheduled buys, etc. Its just crazy making. So I told my husband maybe I would try just putting a bin of "all girls clothing, sized 0-12 months" box and selling the whole lot via craigs list, but he was trying to rein me in and reminding me that it might just not be worth the time and effort and actual monetary return. It might just be time to let it all go!
There are now a few kids clothing exchanges you can do online, but i'd imagine that the shipping is a nightmare expense. But I think the value is you trade with someone to get the size you need and its all free.
Now a friend of mine really thrives on getting her girls the latest and greatest in specialty boutique clothing and rather than saving it for the younger girl, she has more fun in trying to resell it as quickly as possible via eBay and fancy consignment shops and then take more time again each season to shop for the latest and greatest again. Again, crazy making to me. But she says she has fun with it, its like her hobby.
So I say unless you really want to be putting in the effort this all takes, donate away!!

Well...I have only done this twice (only two consignment shops in town) but the policy for both shops was that you can only use store credit there, and only half of store credit for each purchase. you are also only allowed to purchase clothing with store credit gained from clothing. I think this is a fairly universal thing because so many people want to sell their kids' clothes.
There is always the option of using craigslist. I have seen alot of clothing on there for children/Infants/toddlers but I am not sure how fast it sells.
A good option if this doesn't seem right for you is to find a family that is low-income (and truly in need of help) or even multiple families, and donate it. You don't get any money, but an amazing sense of pride for helping others in need, and your daughters clothes are used again. This is what I do because I just can't see trying to sell the baby clothes for almost nothing.

You may want to contact some of the shops in your area. The ones I deal with in the Champaign/Urbana area have specific rules about what you can bring, how much you can bring and on what days you can drop off. You wont be able to drop it all at once if you have been saving stuff for quite a while. A tip if youve never consigned before, most of the places are real picky about what they will accept and it's disenchanting sometimes that they turn down perfectly good clothes sometimes for no reason.

Once upon a child has a limit of 2 garbage bags full per drop off.
To be honest I've had more luck selling on Ebay, more money and you can sell more things - they are very picky at Once Upon a Child, a lot of times don't take things that are perfectly fine...
On Ebay you can sell all, just make sure you give good descriptions if there is staining, rips etc...

We had big bins full of clothes (non wrinkled and neatly stacked) and we were told that they only accept the smaller bins (13 gal?) and clothes ONLY in season. They did take 2 of the bins and only took complete sets that were almost in mint condition. They used to give you a break down of what they bought from you and how much they gave you for each piece, but they no longer do that. With the 2 bins we dropped off, we were given $13.00. I have no idea how many pieces they took, but I do know I received a call from them which stated "we've went thru your bins and you have 24 hours to pick the bins up". I have no idea what would have happened if we didn't pick them up within 24 hours, but I assume they would have taken everything in there and tried to sell them at a later date. The only reason why we went to Once Upon a Child was because we were going to donate the rest of the clothes to Good Will and a neighbor suggested we try OUC first. For me, I don't think it's worth the trip. But, if you are goin to do it, separate them in seasons and use safety pins to pin the sets together. Don't even think of trying to sell them shoes because one scuff mark = no sale. I believe they give you 30% of what they claim they will sell the items for, but who really knows. You might be better off going to your local church and see when they have their annual resale days and try to sell them there. DuPage Co fairgrounds has 2-3 different functions where you can sell your clothes there too. A school across the street from Edwards (Highlands, I think) also has 2 resales per year - spring and fall.

Good luck.

Oh yeah, and have you thought about www.freecycle.org. There are lots of people who would be interested in your clothes, but I'd break them down to smaller bags and for sure separate the sizes. It's a great website and it's totally for free and in most cases, the person who picks up your goods will email you back with a sincere thank you. Once they are done using the clothes, chances are, they will freecycle them again so more than one family will get some good use out of the clothes.