People complain about garage sales no longer having games/etc...

[Crazy Climber]

Hello

So, I always hear people saying how garage sales no longer have classic games/etc.. and how they miss the days they were readily available. Being a man of nostalgia I decided to do something last Saturday. They had one of those neighborhood garage sales that 50 or so houses participated in. I was participating but I did not really "plan" for what I did. At the last minute I took HUNDREDS of classic games loose and CIB and put them in bins. I purposely sprinkled some "rares" in there so people could hunt and find things, recapture those old days. Had a few more hard to find things I planned on sprinkling in throughout the day as people cherry picked the good stuff. Games ranged from Atari 2600, Intellivision, NES, Vectrex, Sega Genesis, SNES, imports handhelds and more... I literally had 100 or so CIB games and a few giant bins of loose stuff. Had a table full of systems, it was epic.

 

I priced all loose games at $1 and all boxed games at $2. I also priced all systems (all working and complete) at $5.

 

I'm not going to post a list of what I had (don't want a bunch of PM's asking me to sell them for a buck, lol) but I had at least a dozen $20ish range games hidden in the piles with a dozen more ready to slip in throughout the day. It really was the kind of haul that if I personally saw at a garage sale I would have sh*t myself and bought EVERYTHING! I just wanted to do something fun and I don't really have time to sell all this stuff right now, I knew I would lose a lot of money but what the heck right? I don't know what got into me...except....

 

NOT ONE GAME OR SYSTEM SOLD!!

 

I kid you not man, nothing... I had at least 100 people walk through, I saw a few guys grab their phones and start Ebay checking a few games but not one video game sale. Looking back it's a good thing, I would have missed out on a ton of money, but I just wanted to give a few people a "garage sale story" I guess. Thought it would be fun to watch people trying to contain themselves and act "casual" as they cherrypicked through my rares. An experienced collector would have noticed there was several hundred dollars worth of stuff that could have been had at a fraction of the cost.

 

I remember a 12 or so year old kid clutching a nice Gameboy Advance SP (CIB) that I priced at five bucks and his Dad saying No...what a cheapskate, lol

 

Anyways, I tried man, I tried... not doing that again, lol

 

[+Omega-TI]

People in the video game market somewhat parallel those in 'the art world'. You have a select group of people willing to spend big bucks on certain works, while other pieces end up at a thrift store or in a land fill. If it's "NOT YOUR THING", it's probably not worth anything to you. Those garage sales types simply may not have been dedicated "Gamers".

 

You know, if I had the money for a Monet or Picasso, I'd still buy a COPY and save a boat load of money... or download a high quality image off the Internet, frame it and put it on my wall for mere pennies in ink.

[S1500]

Veddy interesting. Considering the fact we're both local, and you know I and several others would have spotted the interesting merch in seconds.

[BigO]

Just goes to show that we've given up going to garage sales to find vintage gaming stuff.

[+save2600]

Must be the area. When I had a garage sale last year with a bunch of vintage gaming and computer related things, ended up selling quite a bit of it for decent money and even made a couple of "friends". Sold vintage gaming merchandise too, like board games, action figures, plush, random 2600 games, a PS2 slim, some PS1/PS2 games, a boxed TI-99/4A with joysticks and some games for $50, a C64 system and a pong system. Don't think I even had to advertise it as a mantique sale or anything. Like-minded people just came out of the woodwork!

 

Come to think of it, sold more video gaming related merchandise during the day or two we had a garage sale than it takes for my stuff to move within a year or two here. WTF?!?

 

(yes, similar prices)

[akator]

NOT ONE GAME OR SYSTEM SOLD!!

 

 

All this tells me is that you should move to a new neighborhood.

 

Or maybe that Brony costume you were wearing scared everyone off? Still, in the right neighborhood that wouldn't matter

[+GoldenWheels]

Boxed games at 2$? Systems at 5$? Import handhelds? Vectrex games? Jeez I would have cleaned you OUT had I happened across this (more likely I would have said "bro this stuff is worth way more are you sure?" and you would have explained what you did and we would have grabbed a beer).

[S1500]

Heck, I would have done some "cleaning out" and I know him!

[Mitkraft]

That really is a cool story but I'm not sure what exactly it tells us except to maybe prove that we really have stopped hitting the garage sales and thrift stores for lack of success. I seriously can't believe you didn't even sell one. Well, I take that back, I think people interested in and looking for vintage games are a minority at garage sales. I think the two major groups hitting the garage sales are people with little money and people into vintage/antique stuff like clothes, furniture and housewares. I also think your rare games might have suffered by being not only sprinkled in with commons, but with the low price people just assumed they were crap games. I've seen it a lot where something valuable is seriously under priced and never sells but when it gets priced at a more appropriate level suddenly people recognize it as valuable.

[The Usotsuki]

If I see a tag sale, I see a game I want, the price is right and I got the money to burn, I'll buy.

 

Lately it's only happened once.

[Keatah]

I had a carton of Siders I was trying to sell, this was years ago back in the late 80's when they were still somewhat useful. I couldn't move them at $20 But when I priced them at $200 they were gone before noon time. With one guy asking if he could pay and pick one up on payday.

 

It's like those expensive watches. Price them under $10,000 and you get very little interest. Raise it to $50,000 and better set up a waiting list.

[Crazy Climber]

Yeah, it was crazy watching the things I viewed as total crap selling instantly. Old chairs, tables, furniture just flew out the door. For 80's stuff the board games, comics and baseball cards went quick (none of them were of any value, I checked) CD's and DVD's were great sellers. Some guy even bought all the racks I was using to hold my junk (I was planning on tossing them afterwards, those things were beat, lol) all and all the sale was a success as I made some decent money from stuff I was going to toss or donate. I'm not mad the games didn't sell and actually a bit relieved as I would imagine having a lot of regret now that it's over (it was a TOTAL impulse thing, I do that sometimes) I'm just amazed NOBODY bought any of them. I get 99.9% of people don't care about vintage games but NOBODY BOUGHT ANYTHING!! Not even a system...Amazing really, lol

Edited June 4, 2015 by Crazy Climber

[+Rick Dangerous]

I can't believe my dad wouldn't give me $5 bucks for the GBA. Friggin' jerk....

[+5-11under]

PM sent for some cheap games.

[Crazy Climber]

PM sent for some cheap games.

Believe it or not I have already got a few, lol

[+boxpressed]

If you had advertised your sale on CL, you would have been cleaned out by resellers, probably.

[+5-11under]

Believe it or not I have already got a few, lol

 

Not from me as you noticed. I was joking, although... .

[fdurso224]

Hi guys,

 

I haven't been to a garage sale in years. I stopped because nothing looked interesting to pick up. However, flea markets were always fun to go and did pick up a few SNES and Neo-Geo CD controllers recently.

 

Anthony...

[AceHart]

Hmm, interesting. Surprised you didn't sell even one. I still look at garage sales for Atari games, but leave empty handed.

I have better luck at two venues: (1) a retro game and arcade store at Madison Sq. Mall (got 10 Atari games for $5 total last trip / 5 of them were M Network - no valuable ones, but hey) and (2) trash on the side of the road. Yes, it wasn't too long ago I found a 1940's rotary phone in great shape and working condition, a bunch of vacuum tubes, and a C64 thrown out in a big pile. I picked up the phone and tubes, but regrettably not the Commodore. BUT I know somebody did, because I later came back and it was gone. (The actual trash was still there, so I know it wasn't trash pick-up that took it.) No Atari stuff, but eh. Never know what people will throw out. I wouldn't dumpster dive, though.

[jhd]

I hit (most of) the garage sales in my immediate neighbourhood, but the lack of a vehicle (and my inability to drive) means that I am not going to anything far across town -- especially with the low odds of finding anything.

 

I too am very surprised that there was Zero interest in your games. I could perhaps see there being more limited interest in the Intellivision/2600/Vectrex games, but I would have expected that the non-sports NES/SNES/Genesis games would have gone VERY quickly -- especially to a reseller.

[carlsson]

Was this neighbourhood garage sale in any way advertised, with posters or else? Otherwise, few resellers or collectors would drive around the streets looking to see if anyone has put up tables and were trying to sell something on a Saturday morning. At least I don't drive around in random neighbourhoods just in case someone is having a spontaneous sale, which brings down the number of possible buyers to those living in the neighbourhood and by word of mouth knew you all would gather for a spring sale.

[BigO]

Generally speaking, people put up temporary signs on the major roads just outside their neighborhood to direct traffic to their sale. Pretty effective, though you still have to be driving around the major roads looking for sales.

 

Depending on location, using this method, one can get all the traffic that their sale can handle. However, an ad on craigslist with the right keywords could surely bring in buyers who are specifically looking for vintage gaming stuff.

 

Having said that, every craigslist ad that I've seen specifically advertising this kind of stuff was priced fairly high so I wouldn't be inclined to attend such a sale. I suppose you could be careful to say something like "old Atari tapes" and not list prices if you want to bring in bargain hunters who think you don't know what you have.

[wolfy62]

That is a very funny story! I have one of those garage sales coming up, and we usually have 100 homes selling stuff every year. I was going to do the same to unload a bunch of Gamecube and PS2 and Xbox stuff.

 

I sold pretty well a couple years ago, so I will see!

[icemanxp300]

It's because you put them out at the very end. All the major collectors/resellers have hit everything within 2-3 hrs and after that call it quits as it is very unlikely anything good is left.

[+frankodragon]

I had the same experience when I wanted to sell old computers/video games. People usually look but never buy. Or they say,"Hey look Intellivision games. I remember those." But some dick who came over and wanted me to buy from him a computer, for crying out loud, said I won't sell any of my stuff, blah blah blah pretty much ruined my enthusiasm to organize a rummage sale anymore.