167: Learn How You Can Earn More By Thrifting - Jason T. Smith
Jason is America's #1 thrifter and spends his time touring the country teaching others how to thrift and flip online. Jason was the star of Spike TV's Thrift Hunters and now hosts 2 Youtube shows Thrifty Business & Selling Past Your Expiration Date, Being Thrifty Over 50.
Interesting Notes A few years ago, Jason taught his retired parents how to sell on eBay. They are 76 years old and flip a lot of water skis and TV-VCR combo. They are making $2,000 a month selling part-time on eBay. Jason and his mom started the YouTube show called Selling Past Your Expiration Date Being Thrifty Over 50. It is a once a week, late at night talk show about thrifting for senior thrifters and sellers. Her mom loves doing the show and enjoys it. It made her a celebrity on YouTube. She would go to flea markets, and people would recognize her. And Jason, being a Mama's boy, enjoys it. He finds it fun to watch the older generation hosting YouTube shows. Jason loves to go to thrift stores. Someone tried to call him a picker, but he likes to call himself a thrifter. Pickers love to dig in attics, basements, and old barns. But Jason with a 6'5 feet height is not into getting on his knees and crawling around. He prefers going to thrift stores with air conditioning and bathrooms which is more comfortable. His wife has a corporate career. She stands five feet and three quarters. When they go thrifting, his wife searches from the middle shelf down while he searches from the middle shelf up. Jason is a big music nerd. He has over 4,000 CDs, alphabetized on shelves in his little library in their house. When he goes thrifting, he would conquer first the Media Section because that is what he knows well. His first stop is the Music Section. He would crash the CDs Section and pull out all the gems. Then, he would go to the Cassettes Section and check for eight tracks. He would also look through the record section to find video and computer games. After conquering the section he knows best, he would work on the rest of the store. He would hit over to the Men's Clothing because he is a man and he wears clothes. He is well versed in Men's T-shirts, button-down shirts, and jackets. He also knows what jeans are good to flip and so he would conquer that section too. Early on, he had also flipped bras because there's good money in used bras. But he made a one-time mistake of grabbing the same bra at the same time a lady had grabbed it on. So he made a note to himself to always shop on the right side of the bra rack. When he had his TV show Thrift Hunters, there is a group of guys who kept on poking him online. These guys only sold fine men's wear - high-end button-down shirts, suit coats, blazers, and the like. He does not use those stuff because he lives in Vegas and rarely wears sleeves on his shirts. But he took on the challenge. One day, he went thrifting a whole store. He went into its Sport's Coat Section. With his iPad, he looked up every single brand on eBay sold listings. Doing it, he saw what was hot and was not. On that day, he bought a sports coat for $5. He ended up selling it for $300. Since he learned the Sport's Coat Section, he went into one the other day. He was in Boston for a trip and he snagged out two sports coat. One was an Italian that cost $100 and the other cost $50. He estimated that the price to sell on eBay would be $599 or $699. He also flipped neckties. They are super duper easy to ship and has no weight. The novelty neckties were great 10 years ago. It vanished so he stopped looking for it. Then on his Boston trip, he found some cool and unique neckties. Jason's house is 4,000 sq. ft. big full of his Tiki Mugs collection. 50% of which comes from thrifting. He has a bamboo bar, the size of one room, full of his collection. He got rid of it because he bought a new bar that matched their furniture. So their house is a mess of the mugs he bought in the last six months. He filled their new bar with the duplicates that need to be sold or traded. And he got 200 extra ceramic vessels, most of which are in the boxes. That is a lot of space, a lot of money that has already been paid, and a lot of profit just waiting. But his Tiki Mug collection is full so if something new comes in that he likes better, he lets go of something old. And he keeps that flow. If and when he wants to sell his stuff, it is worth way more than he paid for it. A Tiki Mug is a collectible mug where cocktails are served. It is made of a ceramics. You can take it home for a price. It is found in Tiki Bars. Tiki Bars started in the 30s. Thrift stores think they are a vase so they are in the vase section. Every Tiki Mug has a name. The modern Tiki Mugs have a manufacturer at the bottom of the mugs. Oftentimes, they have a year and the designer. If you don't know what it is, you can message Jason on Facebook and he will tell you. If he needs it, he will buy it from you before you even get out of the thrift store. He has a class in Portland. A new...