Etsy, Too

In addition to my Defunkd shop, I've also opened up an Etsy shop.

Etsy Shop

This is my first item on Etsy...



Who couldn't use a 1985 shark fishing tournament shirt?

Defunkd

I've set up a store on the very excellent Defunkd website. Have a look:

Shirt Sounds Shop

In the mean time, Boiler Up! with this one:

Say What?

Here is the exact description of a vintage Green Day that shirt I have for sale:

"You are bidding on a 1995 Green Day Dookie t-shirt, as pictured, sized XL. Pit-to-pit measures 23 inches and top-to-bottom measures 26 inches. Has track listing on back. Graphics have some wear, there are a couple ink spots, and a small pinhole on the bottom front. However, shirt is very, very wearable. Keeping that in mind, I am going to start this low instead of some jacked up $70.00-$100.00 price. Let me know if you have any questions."

Here is an actual question:

"What year is the shirt from?"

Really? It makes me wonder how many people actually read descriptions and if they are ever disappointed when they receive items with minor flaws.

Green Day



Finally, this is one sweet Mickey Mouse shirt I have up right now:

Mickey

Sold... to No One!

The Minnie Mouse shirt and the girl's Levi jacket did not sell. I'll, more than likely, re-list them when I get back from vacation. However, the following items did sell:

Dolly Parton fetched $16.00
My vintage guy's Levi's jacket sold for $20.50:



I also sold some non-vintage shirts. A new Zep shirt went for only $5.24 and a mid-90s Metallica shirt sold for $7.00.

So, a few weeks ago when I took a trip to the Goodwill Outlet store I stopped by a couple of other Goodwills on the way, one in Lebanon and one in Indianapolis. Quite frankly, they both kinda sucked. Granted, I could have been at each store on a "bad" day, but stopping by those stores made me appreciate our three Goodwills even more. The turnover on items is quite high. I can search the racks and racks of shirts and find new vintage shirts every trip; not to mention records and video games, which are two other items I like to collect and sell. I attribute this to living in a medium-sized city. Obviously with three stores there is an abundance of donations to be had, but our city isn't so huge that it is picked over all of the time, yet, at the same time, it's not so small that the same items sit on the shelves for weeks. On my vacation, I plan to stop at some thrift stores and it will be interesting to compare.

Somethin' for the Ladies

As tonight's auctions wind down, I thought I'd make a new post. I'm actually auctioning off some "girly" items tonight. This is a nice mid-to-late 80s Minnie Mouse shirt:



Shirt has the Hanes Beefy-T tag:



The tag says it's a medium, but the shirt is actually pretty big. So, perhaps "Beefy" is a nice way of saying it's for larger individuals? I don't know. It has a small spot on it but overall is in pretty great shape. No bids, yet, though.

I've been learning a bit about dating vintage Levi's stuff, too. I found this very nice "For Girls" denim jacket last week:



It actually fits me very well... but, I do have a girly shape. Though, I have my suspicions as to whether or not this one is actually vintage. Basically, if a Levi's jacket has only two pockets it is supposed to be older, however, they did/do make repros. Currently, on the Levi's site, the newest repros have six pockets, so it just might be older.

Finally, and this is not quite vintage (I'd say 1990s), we have this awesome tee:



I actually bought this for myself to wear, but I am very particular about the fit of my shirts and the collar is just a wee bit big for my neck. Surprisingly, there is a bidding war going on over the shirt, so it will all work out... someone gets a sweet Dolly Parton shirt and I get some money.

When my auctions end, I will come back and list what they sold for just for fun. Maybe I will do this regularly. I'll be out of town next week, so I'll have to pick this idea up in a couple of weeks.

Sold... to a Guy in Japan?

It's quite strange how many people from other countries completely ignore the shipping restrictions on my E Bay auctions. This has happened numerous times. My auctions are marked as 'Shipping to: United States.' The sole reason I set my shipping up this way is because it saves me a trip to the Post Office. Well, that and then I don't have to fill out a customs declaration form. I print out my own labels, and a bubble mailer with a t-shirt in it easily fits into my mailbox, so delivery is speedy. If the payment is instant, often I can have a shirt in the mail within minutes of the end of an auction. Sometimes people ask before bidding, but more often than not they just bid... and win. I just want to e-mail them a nice message along the lines of "Can't you freakin' read?!" Though, that, literally, might be the problem; a language barrier. Taking that into consideration, I've never turned anyone down. The Post Office is exactly one block from my apartment, so it's not a huge deal, but, let's face it, walking there in the winter is no fun at all, even for a block. Anyway, I hope Hori in Sendai enjoys this shirt showcasing one of many embarrassing periods in Rolling Stones history:

Outlet and About

My trip to the Goodwill Outlet store was very interesting, to say the least. Since least is not what I want to convey, I will go into detail.



This was my first time going to an outlet store of this nature and it was far from what I had expected. I'm not quite sure what I had expected, though, but this was far from it. First of all, if you've never been to one of these stores, let me explain how it all works. There is a gigantic open floor with some items (TVs, couches, dressers, etc.) on one side and on the back wall. In the middle there are huge plastic bins on rollers, or wheels, if you prefer fancy talk. Bolted to the floor are small bumpers which enable the Goodwill employees to situate the bins into perfect position and, obviously, to keep them in place while people browse. Here is where the excitement happens. Every two hours, on the odd hour, the employees pull all of the bins to the back and switch them out with all new bins. At this point, it gets pretty intense, in a Pavlovian sense.

I noticed most people lined up where the shoe bins were about to be placed. Apparently, people love dirty old shoes. So, they roll the carts out and then it's a free-for-all. At this point, I could already tell who was new to the experience simply by the fact that they did not have a cart. I did not have a cart. You see, everything is sold by the pound. From the Goodwill Indy website:

Clothing, housewares, books, toys, DVDs and CDs: 69 cents per pound.
Glass: 49 cents per pound.
Paired shoes: 99 cents per pound.

As you may have guessed, that is cheap! I mean how much can a DVD actually weigh? So, back to this free-for-all. Just as I could tell who was inexperienced, it was easy to tell who had played this game before. Gloves. These people were serious and the bins really were dirty and dusty. After watching for a few minutes I decided to start browsing myself. It's a little crazy. You'll be digging through some items and then shit will just start flying from every direction as people are trying to discard what they don't want as they dig deeper. I was examining a copy of Heart's "Dreamboat Annie" and a fuckin' purple dinosaur (not Barney) went whizzing right by my hands. Again, these people are serious... or maybe just rude. Probably a combination of both. Either way, it is a feeding-frenzy type of atmosphere and quite something to behold in person.

Here's the kicker: 95% of the items were pure dogshit. Right away I could tell that most of the merchandise had to be the stuff that didn't sell at other Goodwills because they still had the colored tags on them... err, I mean tags of color. Even the furniture items weren't in the best shape. Then again, you can't really argue with an $11.99 couch. Finding a t-shirt, let alone a vintage shirt, was simply impossible. I think I only saw about eight adult-sized t-shirts in all of the bins combined. That is not to say that there was a lack of clothing. Every other bin was filled with clothes. People, and families, literally had multiple carts overflowing with clothes. Then I started to realize something.

Most of the shoppers seemed to be from low-income families. Of course, it's not good to make assumptions, but when a teenage girl is buying her bras from a dirty old bin in a warehouse, she's probably not rich. This was definitely not a hipster shopping spot. In that sense, the store is really, really great. I grew up "food stamp poor," so I know what it's like to not have cool clothes. Though, I did have a pretty sweet Dukes of Hazzard shirt and my brother had an awesome Fonzie ringer. Point being, it's good that families can spend small amounts of money and provide clothing for their kids. It was also pretty obvious that people were spending their whole Sunday there, waiting for every bin change.

Now, about the 5% of stuff that is not dogshit: I did meet a picker named Mike. I had noticed a guy, with his own family in tow, and all of their carts were full of vintage board games. Yes! I struck up a conversation with him and it turned out that he comes to the outlet store often to pick board games and sell them on E Bay. Since the merchandise changes every two hours, I imagine if you lived close by, the store would be excellent for that kind of shopping. Other than that, I didn't see too many worthwhile items, sans the guy who scored a guitar. Can you imagine paying for a guitar by the pound? At 69 cents a pound to boot. I also found a 1962 Superman comic book, but the cover was missing. I don't think there is much of a market for comics with no covers.

Overall, I'm not really sure if I'd go back. I think if I went with a group of people it might be fun, just for the experience. However, you would definitely have to stay through two bin changes to make it worthwhile. Two hours isn't that bad, if you think about it.

After that, I went to the regular Goodwill that was a couple blocks away and scored this, oh-so-funny, vintage tee:



This baby is nice and soft and has the early to mid-'80s Screen Stars tag.



Mr. Natural Gas is going to Maria's shop. By the way, that Bloomington, Minnesota shirt sold in less than a day. Maybe someone thought it said Bloomington, Indiana.

What a Rough Day

So, at Goodwill today, I found a rare Muppets soundtrack, in great condition, on vinyl... then proceeded to drop it on the damn floor and watch it crack. No! Then one of the workers told me one of her friends likes me. Too bad he was a nineteen year-old dude. To top it all off, I accidentally bought the non-minty kind of mouthwash at the store. I can't imagine anyone suffering as much as I did today. Though, I doubt I was suffering as much as the guy who asked if there was "a special zip code" they used to open the collectibles case. I'm pretty sure the poor fellow meant... well, I'm not sure what he meant, but I do know you can not open a lock with a zip code.

On the bright side, I picked this awesome 1985 AFC Conference Champions Miami Dolphins shirt:



I will probably put this on E Bay tomorrow night. It's a nice shirt. This is from when Russell started the Jerzees line of t-shirts in the mid-'80s.



By the way, the Fins got clobbered 38-16 by the Niners in that particular Super Bowl.

Finally, I was able to snatch a copy of the beloved "Pet Sounds" album; my first one from Goodwill. I've picked up the cassette and 8-track versions, but never the record.



It's actually the version coupled with the "Carl and the Passions - 'So Tough'" LP. Of course, the "Carl" portion of the package was missing and the record itself is well-played, but, hey, it's "Pet Sounds," so you freakin' buy it!

Tomorrow: Goodwill Outlet Center.

Prince is from Minnesota, Right?

So, this blog is going to be about some of the shirts I'm selling and some other random things I find in thrift stores.



Look at that. It's a purple Prince record. "When Doves Cry," if you must know... one of the greatest guitar intros to a song, ever. Despite being very nice and clean, the b-side decided to skip twice on me. That b-side; this is the title: "17 Days (the rain will come down, then U will have to choose. If U believe, look 2 the dawn and U shall never lose.)" I'm not fuckin' making that up. It's printed on the record. Though, since he's Prince he can do whatever he wants. Speaking of soft and fuzzy things from Minnesota, here is a shirt from Bloomington, Minnesota:



I've never been to Bloomington, Minnesota, but there's not way it's as cool as Bloomington, Indiana.



Hanes Fifty-Fifty tag; from the mid/late '80s. I am going to put this in Maria's shop tomorrow, the Velvet Underground Boutique at 1024 Main Street in Lafayette, Indiana:

Velvet Underground Boutique

Finally, check this out:



I have no idea if this is an ancient early Megadeth shirt or if some hood made it in his garage. Either way, it is totally awesome and old. Methinks someone is going to get some new church-wear.