Shoes seemed to be a running theme, in a manner of speaking, at the most recent town-wide garage sale in Secaucus, held on Saturday, Aug. 29.
“I sold a lot of girls’ shoes,” said Erin Quinones on Pandolfi Avenue, on a lawn spread with children’s clothing and Halloween costumes.
“We sold all of grandma’s shoes,” said her friend Yanina Martinez from a table on the same lawn, where her son Chris Jason (“C.J.”), 11, was selling homemade crafts in an effort to generate enough cash to buy himself a Hoverboard Segway.
“Actually, neither one of us lives here,” admitted Quinones. “Our friend lives here and she’s on vacation. She said we could use it to sell. We’re from Secaucus but we live in townhomes and you’re not allowed to have sales in the townhomes.”
Business on Pandolfi was good, they said, with plenty of customers driving up or strolling past. Around the corner on Second Street the traffic was lighter.
“So far I sold four pair of shoes for $10 and two toys for $7 (together), so I made $17 today,” said Linda. “I did this once before and made enough money to get two pizzas.”
“I don’t like to throw stuff out. I like to repurpose it so that somebody else can use it.” –Eleanor Reindl
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The town-wide sale clearly brought out dealers and nostalgia-hounds, who took advantage of the opportunity to scour the entire community in a single swoop.
“This morning when I was setting up at 7:30 there were like five or six New York plates,” said Eleanor Reindl. “One guy was looking for old watches. Another guy was looking for old video games.”
Reindl, who has participated in the town-wide sales regularly in the past, said she did surprisingly good business this time, given the out-of-the-way location of her home behind Clarendon School.
Among the items she sold were – you guessed it – footwear: her husband’s old Army boots from 40 years ago. “I don’t like to throw stuff out,” she said. “I like to repurpose it so that somebody else can use it. That’s why I keep stockpiling this stuff in the garage and my husband keeps yelling at me, ‘The car can’t go in the garage.’ But I say somebody might be able to use it. Why pollute the world, you know?”
Collectors’ items for sale
“It’s weird. It comes in waves,” said Darrin Marra, who was named after the character on “Bewitched.” Living at the end of a dead-end street, he fastened a teddy bear to a car and wrote “Sale” with arrows to direct buyers to his home, where a vast array of items was spread on tables in the driveway and across the lawn, most of it selling for $1 each.
“I sold the bear three times. I keep having to replace it,” he said. “We sold some guy two Sega games. I think he collects and keeps them and then he sells or trades just to get the titles he doesn’t have. He has like three or four thousand cartridges. The collectors hit you in the morning. They give you their card.”
“People come up and want vinyl records,” said his wife, Michele. “Yes, we have original pressings of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, or the Beatles. But that’s our stuff.”
Still, there were collectibles to be had. “I sold a Mariano Rivera autographed picture for like $40,” said Ian Karg. “It was really just collecting dust. All my autographed memorabilia is gone other than my rookie Ken Griffey. It’s a pretty decent card. When I went out to Cooperstown I probably bought that for $200. I don’t want it anymore, though.”
Karg’s asking price: $25.
Elsewhere in town, young Sean Wallor had his duplicate baseball cards out on display, waiting for that eager collector with a pocket full of cash. But he wasn’t letting them go cheap. Asked about the most expensive item he was selling, he pointed to a card on the table and rattled off stats. “Billy Martin rookie card, 1952 Topps. Excellent condition. Goes for about $350 at a card show. I’m selling it for $300.” And if it didn’t sell at the garage sale, was eBay the next stop?
“I don’t really trust eBay as much as I trust face-to-face, cash in hand,” he said.
Bargains and giveaways
Some enterprising young entrepreneurs took advantage of the day to make money peddling other items. Several kids set up lemonade stands in their driveways. One youngster sat at a table on a corner selling fresh tomatoes grown in his backyard.
While Egda Veloz did a good business selling toys, children’s clothing and, naturally, shoes from her doorstep, her daughter Sarah, 6, hawked cookies, bottled water, and cinnamon rolls at her side.
“We sold quite a bit of children’s stuff,” said Joe Gerbasio, with racks full of secondhand clothing from his two daughters and plenty of toys. “You go to Toys R Us, the things that I’m selling for $5 are like $35. They were made better back then, too. Now everything is not as durable as it was.”
The town-wide garage sale concept worked well, he felt, with people following a route through town carrying a sheet listing the homes hosting sales.
Peter Tusa agreed. “We’ve done it on our own and this is the first time we did it with the town. We did better with the town,” he said. “People park and go up and down the side streets. I don’t think you get the volume on your own.”
Tusa, his wife Lisa, and daughter Kaitlyn, 8, had sold everything from beds to books to bicycles by the afternoon.
“This morning was busy. Everything went,” he said. “And I have a lot more room. I put out mirrors and they lasted about 15 minutes. I was 90 seconds short of a bidding war, which would have been awesome.”
Many of the sellers said they planned to donate any leftover goods to charity. A common sentiment was the satisfaction of recycling items for someone else’s use rather than throwing them away.
“You know what we like?” said Michele Marra. “Sometimes you get people from other countries that send stuff home. And that makes me feel good. I’ll give them as much as I can. It means something, because they can put dozens and dozens of things in a package and send them home.”
Art Schwartz may be reached at arts@hudsonreporter.com.