Car Boots - huge work, little reward (Car Boot Sales)

Member Name: rji0907

Product:	Car Boot Sales
Date:	11/06/09 (232 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Making Money

Disadvantages: time consuming, tiring, and stressful!

I did my first ever car boot sale a couple of weeks ago purely because i had a lot of junk lying around and as like every other family in the country at the moment i have been hit by the credit crunch so i decided to do something about it other than moan for a change!

I got up at 5:15am on a bright Sunday morning (wouldnt have bothered if it had rained!) and set off for my friends house who i had also collared into doing one for me. We arrived at our destination in Worcester at 06:00am and could not believe the height of activity that already surrounded us. I wasnt even awake and people were all set up and ready to go!
We were advised to arrive early as the start time was 07:00am officially and apparently if you do not arrive and get set up before this time you have people literally pulling stuff out of the boot of your car trying to get in there first, though we had this anyway from people car booting who had already set up and wanted to get in their first before the booters arrived.

After setting up i waited patiently for people to flock to my table and slowly but surely this happened. I was certainly not over-run on my stall but took a steady stream of money throughout the morning. What amazed me is the copious amouts of bartering that went on before me. I was in my mind already selling quality (just surplus to requirements) goods for knock down prices and yet still no one wanted to pay the prices i had put my goods up for. I even had one gentleman wanting to buy a childrens toy that i had priced up at 20p asking me if i would take 18p - the cheek of it!!!

Eventually we left at around 12:30pm as sunstroke and fatigue were starting to kick in and as i really could not be bothered to take anything home with me i started shouting that everything on my stall was now 20p to try and get rid - and still i was being knocked down! Its officially true - people really do not want to pay anything for anything nowadays!

In my opinion although i made £100.60 for a mornings work it really was not worth the effort. Dont get me wrong the car boot sale was packed with people - just people who did not want to pay for anything! What with all the sorting, pricing up, loading the car, unloading the car, getting sunburnt and the sheer tiredness of it all it was a hell of a lot of time and effort for not as much reward as i liked. The only thing is if like me you get a friend to do one too at the same time you can get them to watch your table whilst you go bargain hunting yourself!

It was certainly an experience though only one i would repeat once or twice a year at the most. Im not a morning person and i believe Sundays were created for lie-ins. Not a bad way to clear out the clutter and make a bit of cash but be warned for those car boot virgins out there - it really is not as easy or stress free as you may think!

Summary: Ok once or twice a year but certainly not weekly!