Thrift Store for Fulton Mall
As the Brooklyn Eagle reported earlier this week, a new thrift store has opened on the Fulton Mall. Part of the Unique chain of thirft stores, the tri-level, 30,000-square-foot space is trying to be “upscale,” a dubious proposition in our book. But maybe that’ll fly in this location. It certainly wouldn’t fly in Williamsburg! GMAP
As the Brooklyn Eagle reported earlier this week, a new thrift store has opened on the Fulton Mall. Part of the Unique chain of thirft stores, the tri-level, 30,000-square-foot space is trying to be “upscale,” a dubious proposition in our book. But maybe that’ll fly in this location. It certainly wouldn’t fly in Williamsburg! GMAP
Housing Works is located on Montague Street, just to the west of Henry Street, and is noted for their records, books, CDs, furniture and clothing. And it’s not expensive, either.
I can only speak to Housing Works as I was a volunteer there for many years but the pickers and dealers did not get first dibs or special access. They did, however, pay extra to go to the preview nights, which are a fundraiser where you pay $10 or so and get in line like everyone else. And yes, they were very aggressive and did buy a lot and spend thousands of dollars and resell. (I do wonder about Salvation Army and such, because it seems nothing very interesting ends up in their stores anymore, so perhaps they have an arrangement with dealers that I don’t know about.) I don’t see what is unfair about someone scouting thrift shops who has a good eye and then resells. Should there be some kind of rule that what you buy you must wear?
It’s worse than you think Rob – the vintage resale stores and middle-man dealers have special arrangements with thrift stores to get first look at all the designer labels and truly vintage things. The public never even gets to see it. They’re called “pickers” those who have these deals with the thrifts. It’s really dumb of the charity thrift stores because the pickers pay much less than the public would for those things. But once it’s in a retail for-profit vintage store the public pays much more than they would have paid in the thrift store. It’s lose-lose for the public and the charities. It’s why I shop my vintage on eBay almost exclusively. I would never buy anything in one of the very high priced vintage retail stores one sees in Manhattan where they sell 70’s polyester dresses for $100.
Actually, Beacon’s Closet is really selective in the things they’ll accept – I have friends who’ve tried to take stuff there (on consignment I guess) and they turned it down. Don’t think very much of their stuff comes from Goodwill.
without getting into class warfare, places like beacons closet and other “thrift” stores have workers that scour real goodwills and salvation armies and pick out the best stuff and then take them to their “thrift” stores and mark up the prices by like 100000%. it’s rather frustrating when youre in a goodwill and you see some a-hole who obviously isnt shopping there out of need, but just scooping up everything that isnt a Disney denim t-shirt with tweety bird popping out of the breast pocket :-/
perhaps those will come back in fashion one day and they will all be gone too!
hey NYC: u kinda suck.
*rob*
Isn’t Beacon’s Closet still there? We went last summer. It was across the street from the Brooklyn Brewery. Lots and lots of cool customers and great stuff, although not cheap.
We used to call it “Dumpster Warehouse” back in the day, because it was hardly upscale (except for that one room of designer fashions).
Beacon’s Closet did quite well in Williamsburg too. As did Buffalo Exchange. And yeah, thrift stores are half of the retail there now. In fact, that is a fun game — try and guess which stores are selling new and which vintage. Although they also mix and match, it’s not that easy.
RF, I had the same question and I’d be totally excited if it’s the same store! Famous for clothing the tweens of Brooklyn though. 🙂