1. If you advertise it, host it.
Your loaded newspaper ad attracts me. Your failure to conduct the sale at said date and time annoys me. Please don't tempt me to forget I'm a Christian woman and mentally shout curses at your empty driveway and closed garage door when you should be fulfilling your advertised promises.
2. List your address, not your neighborhood.
A cleverly-named cult of matching mailboxes and overgrown bungalows may swell you with pride and satisfy the worth of those exorbitant HOA fees, but your cookie-cutter neighborhood is not the center of the universe. I want to come to your garage sale, not Parade of Homes. If google can't find it, neither can I.
3. Place enough signs to adequately direct me to your sale.
Advertisement along the main road is great, but don't send me on a wild goose chase only to leave me stranded in your neighborhood. It wastes my time, my gas, and makes my kids cranky. Until you can install a yellow brick road, I need a little guidance at the fork in the road. Pound in a sign, and make sure the arrows are pointing in the proper direction.
4. Make merchandise clearly visible to the street.
A large portion of your clientele is young mothers like me who must determine if the items are worth parking, air-conditioner turn-offing, unbuckling, and herding for. Boxes or large, brightly-colored objects offer potential promises of reward for this effort. And if your garage does not face the road, please place enough objects in the driveway to entice me. I grew up hearing a true story of a woman who was murdered while hosting a sale in her backyard-facing garage. I wish to shop, not be murdered. Interesting items help ensure the risk will be worth my while.
5. Ease up on the lemonade pressure.
I do not buy things I don't want or need. My polite "No" means no. Any children further proselytizing over-priced punch cease to be cute and officially join the ranks of telemarketers, mall kiosk representatives, infomercials, and street evangelists. And mom, please don't glare at me...in the long run, I am encouraging your little entrepreneurs to strive for excellence in something other than promoting the sale of flimsy, mass-marketed products from China. Call me this winter--they can shovel my driveway or some other useful business endeavor.
6. Arrange your tables like a U, not a W.
Inner garage traffic jams prompt my fight-or-flight response, not my shop-til-you-drop one. I will not enter your garage if I clearly assess I will become trapped in your garage. Make the center table an island, not a peninsula.
7. If you don't have more than one table, don't bother.
Seriously. Drop it off at Goodwill, people.
8. Clearly price your items.
If you will not put forth the effort to price your items, I will not put forth the effort to purchase them. Pricing in general gives me a good idea if you are a fair, decent person looking to get rid of clutter and give someone a deal while making a few bucks, or if you are a greedy scab sitting in your garage all day trying to make a living off your basement full of glass mugs, dusty VHS cassettes, and Beanie Babies. I will negotiate with you only if I know I will not offend you.
9. Remember you are hosting a garage sale, not opening a branch of Gymboree.
Children's clothes are a temporary necessity, not an eternal investment. Just because you paid full price for that precious, owl-embroidered romper your blessing only wore for two weeks doesn't mean I want to. I do not know if your child spit-up, pooped, or peed in their attire, but I bet they did and I know mine will. I refuse to pay more than $1 for their clothing items. So if you price your clothes $1, I may purchase a garment or two. But if you can hook me at $.50-cents or less, I may just walk my bag-laden self down your driveway having made you $10-$20 richer. Price to sell, not to profit.
10. When the sale is over, take down your signs.
Every. Single. One.
Just don't try to sell it to me.
