Sale Shoppers Know Gems From Junk

For one fleeting moment, Jim Green dismissed the law of supply and demand and the other market maxims he applies as a professional shopper to answer one simple business question: Why would one man buy another man’s junk?

Like some suburban version of Rodin’s “The Thinker,” he sat forward in the lawn chair he had virtually stolen for two bucks and rested his elbow on the jazz lps he picked up for fifty cents apiece.

“Well,” he said, “you have to be able to tell the jewels from the junk. Anyone who knows anything about shopping can go right to the good stuff.”

Green is a government buyer. Every day, he looks for good deals on stuff such as fax machines and office furniture. On Saturday, this well-schooled bargain hunter found the the Big Daddy of them all: the annual Junior League rummage sale at the Del Mar fairgrounds.

It’s a yearly charity sale that brings out the killer instinct in otherwise relatively sane San Diegans. These aren’t shoppers, they’re stalkers. And they make bargain basement days at Bloomingdales look like a black-tie affair.

Rummage sale regulars have been known to fight over a pair of britches, each pulling on a pants leg like a Turkey Day wishbone until they split up the middle. They bare flesh, shamelessly trying on clothes right out in the open, jealously eye-balling nearby shoppers who might have found the perfect fit.

This is how it works: Members of the Junior League of San Diego save cast-offs all year and store them in an undisclosed warehouse. Then, when the autumn air has just the right chill, they truck it to the fairgrounds exhibit hall for a shopping free-for-all.

Well, it’s not exactly free but pretty darn close. Hal Smith of El Cajon got an old bike for a five-dollar bill. Smith wasn’t shopping for wheels, of course. But at that price, he said, who could resist? And besides, all the proceeds go to charity.

Fernando Villalongin did a plie on a pair of roller skates. “I haven’t roller-skated for 15 years so I’m a little wobbly,” he said. “But for ten bucks, I had to have ‘em. I mean, it’s an art to find good stuff amid all this junk.”

Villalongin said his roommate has been a rummage sale regular for 15 years. This year, he said, the good stuff went early because the junior-leaguers opened on Friday afternoon for a preview sale.

For the first time in 46 years, the group charged $3 admission to the preview and sold everything for double the price. Still, there were 2,000 people waiting outside. Like zealous concert-goers, some had even camped overnight.

People like Jim Green were pretty mad about that. He said that to open the doors before working people had a chance to show up wasn’t just junior league, it was downright bush league.

Other people were mad because they had to pay $1 admission on Saturday, according to event business manager Linda Starkey. “I guess they didn’t realize that this is a charity event. We’re not putting anything in our pockets.”

Last year, the Junior League made more than $90,000 selling things that might have graced the county landfill. This year, they hope to make even more.

On Saturday, bargain hunters filled the fairgrounds parking lot. The quarter-mile-long walkway to the exhibit hall became a parade of people who looked like they’d picked the wrong door on “Let’s Make a Deal.” There were people with toilet seats, basketball hoops, lamps without shades, soiled curtains.

One guy staggered out carrying a golf bag with no clubs, another hauled a huge rabbit cage on his shoulder, his head poking in the wire-framed door.

“Hey buddy,” somebody yelled. “You got any rabbits for that thing?”

“Nope. But I’m gonna get some now.”

Most people were proud of their purchases. But there were also a few curmudgeons, people who were afraid their neighbors might see them hauling hand-me-downs. One guy even yelled at a photographer who snapped his picture.

Inside, the 58,000-square-foot hall, buyers scoured 23 departments, from kiddie clothes to hardware to novelties and notions. When they found what they wanted, they staked out floor space, leaving one person to watch the goods while others rushed back for more.

“We have to watch out for scavengers,” said Amy Chishom of La Mesa, who watched over a huge pile of odds and ends for three friends. “People are constantly pawing through our bags. If we don’t tell them to stop, they take things.”

Added her husband Ken: “Some lady made off with that sewing machine table when we weren’t looking. We found her 20 minutes later after a frantic search.”

While they waited, they sat in two scroungy-looking kitchen chairs. “We’re not buying these, we’re just sitting on them.

“We picked the ugliest ones we could find so someone wouldn’t want to come up and buy them right out from under us,” Ken Chisholm said. “And some guy even tried to do that.”