Make Money at Rhea Lana Consignment Sale
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Kids consignment sales are getting really popular and for good reason, they are awesome for great deals and making a little money off your kids’ unused things. If you want to sell at a children’s consignment event, especially Rhea Lana then l’ll walk you through every step of the process.
There are a lot of kids consignment sales
- Rhea Lana
- WeeSale
- Kids Everywear
- Just Between Friends
- Kid’s Closet Connection
I’m going to walk you through every step of the process as I do in prep for the sale we and then I’m gonna show you how much I made.
Perks of Consigning at a Rhea Lana Consignment Sale
By being a consignor at a Rhea Lana sale, you will be able to get several perks!
Earn 65-75% of Your Sales
When you’re a consignor, you’ll make 65 – 75% of your sales. This is pretty high compared to my other local consignment sales.
Items are Guaranteed Against Loss
If they lose an item that didn’t sell, they’ll give you the sale value of the item in your check at the end of the sale.
Early Shopping Pass
When you’re a consignor, you get to shop early!! Like early enough for the good deals to still be on the shelf!!
Smart Phone Voice Entry
You can add items to your sale by talking to your smart phone. I don’t know how this part is sicne I haven’t tried it before.
Watch Sales Live
You can watch the sales live. You can sign in at any time and see how much stuff you’ve sold and how much money you’ve made.
Check Ready on Pickup Day
A lot of consignment sales make you wait a week or so for your check. Not Rhea Lana! You get your check on pickup day. You don’ thave to come back to pick it up or wait for it to come in the mail.
How to Sell at a Rhea Lana Consignment Event
My first preference when getting and giving kids clothes is to do clothing swaps. But Rhea Lana is a great alternative and not everyone is as into swaps as I am so they’re really valuable!
Before the sale, you’ll want to log into the site and sign up to be a consignor. At that time, you’ll pay a $10 non-refundable consignor fee. This is a super low cost to be put in front of a lot of buyers who are ready to give you their money!
Definitely watch my video if you want to see step by step how I do everything. If you’d rather read then follow along!
1. Choosing the items you wish to sell
The first step is to choose which items you wish to sell. You can check your local consignment sale website for details on everything they will accept for resale. Here are some great things (other than clothes) to sell.
Other things that sell well are
- sporting gear and equipment
- outdoor toys
- baby equipment
- books
- toys
- baby/children’s furniture and bedding
Remember that the sale is only for a season. If it’s the spring/summer sale, they won’t accept fall/winter clothing and vice versa.
2. Getting Items Ready to Sell
Grouping Your Items
The best way to sell clothes at a kids consignment event is to group them. Toys are another thing that sell better in groups. I just bought a huge ziploc full of cars for Kai and it was a no brainer that many cars for that value.
Some consignment sales will have a minimum dollar value per item. If you want to sell a good used condition shirt for $1 and they’re minimum is $2, you’ll need to group multiple shirts together to sell as a lot.
Inspecting Your Clothes
You need to make sure they’re in good used condition or better. If you don’t do a good job inspecting upfront, you will bring back a lot of clothes that weren’t accepted into the sale. Then you’re just doing the work to them ready to sell for nothing.
Some common things to look for when inspecting:
- Stains
- Broken Zippers
- Torn Hemlines
- Missing Buttons
- Missing Batteries
Again, you can check your local consignment sale’s website for full details on how they inspect the items.
Prepare them For Selling
Prepare your items for selling. If you’re selling clothes, you can make sure they’re wrinkle free and on the hanger with the necessary clothes pins to make sure they don’t fall off the hanger.
If you’re grouping a lot of cars together, go ahead and put them in a ziploc bag. This will help you when you go to price the items becuase they’re already organized.
Many consignment sales are very particular about how you prep items for sale. They will want the puzzle pieces taped onto the wooden puzzle board. They will want the hanger facing the same way, etc. Make sure you follow the rules or they’ll turn down your item.
If they turn down your item because it’s not prepared correctly, they’ll let you fix it on the spot. If they’re turning down an item because it’s too worn out, then you’ll just have to take it back with you.
Common Supplies Needed to Sell
Hangers
You will need to have hangers to hang all of the clothes. You can save hangers from when you purchase things as consignment sales and reuse them for when you sell items.
All your clothes should be on plastic hangers and they should be kids size up to size 10. I got 18 kids hanger for $2 at target.
Masking Tape
You can use masking tape to put your consignor # inside of each piece of clothing and on each item. This is just as a precaution just in case your tag falls off. The workers will be able to tell who the item belongs to.
Shipping Tape
This will be used to tape puzzle pieces onto the wooden board, tape the tag onto toys or bags to resell, and more.
Medium Sized Safety Pins (or Larger)
You will have to use safety pins to group clothing items together, make sure the clothing items stay on the hanger, and to pin the price tag onto the front of the clothes.
Cardstock Paper
This is what you’ll use to create your price tags. They will be created from the consignment sale website and printed out. You just cut them out and safety pin or tape them onot your items.
Rubberbands
You can use rubberband to group the clothes in the same size togheter. You’ll just put all of the hangers together and put a rubberband on the top part of the hanger.
Ziploc Bags
You will use these to group a bunch of small pieces to gether to sell as a lot. Examples: cars, socks, etc.
3. Uploading Items to the Website
The next step is to upload your itmes to the website. You will do this so you’ll be able t print out your price tags, keep track of your inventory and money you’re owed.
When you upload an item to the database, you’ll need to enter
- Item description
- Item price
- Whether or not the item can be sold at half price
- Whether or not the item can be donated if it didn’t sell.
Once you have everything uploaded you’re going to close out your batch and select my donation choice.
By donating everything when I drop the clothes off I can drop and go, they’ll put everything out for me. If I wanted anything back I would do a traditional drop off which means I’d have to be present for the quality check then you place your items on the sales floor so you can get them back after the sale they say it takes about a half-hour or 50 items.
Pricing Your Items
When you’re pricing your items, you need to price them to sell (unless you want to take all those clothes back home with you). The people shopping at consignment sales are willing to pay the Facebook Marketplace price. Here are some common pricing suggestions for the Rhea Lana sale.
4. Drop Off at Consignment
The next step is to drop off the items at consignment. You’ve made it ot the finish line!! They will have a specific date and time for you to drop off the items. You will need to plan on being there at least 30 minutes or more.
You’ll have to stand in line and wait for the inspection. They’ll inspect the items in front of you and let you know if there are any problems with your stuff. If they have a problem that you can fix, they’ll let you fix it on the spot. If not, you’ll have to take your item back with you.
Consignor Success Tips
Make sure the clothes are presentable.
Making your items presentable will make them look better on the hanger. This will help them stand out among the people who didn’t do this and will give you a higher success rate during the sale.
Here are some ways to make your clothes look more presentable:
Make sure they’re clean and smell fresh.
If you need a little scent boost (like if they’ve been in storage), add Dreft Fabric Crystals to the load. They’ll smell fresh and they’re safe for kids.
Button, zip, snap, and tie.
If your clothing has any buttons, snaps, zippers, or ties, make sure you button, snap, zip, or tie them. This makes them look more presentalbe on the hanger.
Price the clothes to sell
You don’t want to be stuck with a bunch of clothes that you’ve gotten ready for a consginemtn sale that don’t sell. Then you are doing the work for nothing. You don’t want to take them back with you and you want to sell them. Look at the pricing chart example above for ideas to price your clothing. You’re not looking to get rich here. You’re looking to make enough money to cover your purchases.
Allow your clothes to be sold at half price.
If you allow your clothes to be sold at half price, you’ll sell more items. This will allow the less popular items to be snatched up too. You can pick and choose which items you want to sell at half price. If you have an item that didn;t sell that’s a higher priced brand (like a boutique brand) you can sell for much higher than half price on Facebook Marketplace and don’t necessarily need to take half price for yit. It’s all your choise.
Group items together.
Group items together together so they sell better. If you have a bunch of little pieces (like socks or toy cars), throw them in a ziploc bag and price them together. If you have an outfit (or can make an outfit out of 2 pieces of clothes), sell it as an outfit. If you have a bunch of play condition shorts, bundle them together and sell them together. People like buying bundles at consignment sales and it gets these little items sold for you.
Selling clothes at a consignment sale can be a great way to make money or get free clothes for your children. There are a ton of great deals to be found at a consignment sale.
You can even stock a grandparent’s house for cheap at a consginemtn sale. You may have gotten some new equipment (like a baby bed or a high chair) at your baby shower, but Grandma doesn’t want a fancy new high chair. She can get one from the consignment sale for cheap that’s super clean and in great condition.
Just try one consignment sale, you don’t have anything to lose! They don’t have to take up a lot of time to throw some items into the sale to make a little money and by being a consignor, you’ll be able to get into the sale earlier when all of the good stuff is still on the shelf!! Win-win!! Try it out and let me know how you like it in the comments below.
Jen Smith is a personal finance expert, founder of Modern Frugality and co-host of the Frugal Friends Podcast. Her work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Lifehacker, Money Magazine, U.S. News and World Report, Business Insider, and more. She’s passionate about helping people gain control of their spending.