Now that you’ve finally made an effort to clean out your garage, it’s time to plan a yard sale. Everything that has accumulated has the potential to sell, especially any leftover furniture. However, you want the event to remain as friendly to the environment as possible—learn some tips for having an eco-friendly garage sale here!
Why Have a Garage Sale?
In the process of cleaning out your garage, you might discover a need to clear out space and sell things you no longer need. Hosting a yard sale will do a lot to avoid dumping any waste into the garbage.
Get Your Supplies
Every eco-friendly yard sale needs the right supplies, and by “right,” we mean reused, recyclable materials such as cardboard and paper scraps. Don’t rely on flimsy poster board to make signs; a pizza box or recycled cardboard from a delivery works just as well. Additionally, you can use scraps of paper for labeling, and make sure to rent tables instead of buying—there’s no reason to buy tables you won’t probably won’t reuse.
Go Digital With Advertising
Promoting your yard sale is essential. However, using paper is wasteful, and it can easily fall down and blow away, creating litter. You don’t want to see a flurry of paper around your neighborhood, so try digital advertising instead.
Digital publicity does a lot to save trees. Digital landscapes grow quickly, so there’s a better chance of people remembering where and when your sale is—they can simply refer to the online flyer whenever they need to. Reach out to your neighborhood association or your city’s town hall about posting the garage sale notice on their social media pages, too.
Host a Block Garage Sale
A block garage sale is when everyone who lives on a street cleans out their homes and throws a joint garage sale. This tends to bring in more money and customers than individual garage sales. Everyone from around town and even from a few towns over can come out and sift through your stock to find new treasures.
A block garage sale does a lot to reduce excess waste. Having a one-day or week-long block garage sale event helps things sell more quickly and reduces clutter. As you prepare, have neighbors reuse signs and advertising materials to avoid creating more.
Properly Dispose of Items
Sometimes, items simply don’t sell. If it happens to you, don’t throw them away—donate them instead. Donating unsold items gives someone else a chance to love your things again without negatively affecting the environment.
This list of eco-friendly garage sale tips will help you learn how to not create waste when selling old items. Try creating a community garage sale event to reduce everyone’s carbon footprint and to provide a better way for other people to properly get rid of their items.
