Tiffany Tastes on a Thrift-Store Budget : Commerce: Thousands of value-seekers throng Goodwill’s sale of premium goodies.

She could have had her pick from a rack of fur coats all under $50, a pair of blue-and-gray Tony Lama boots for $27 or matching crystal decanters at $24.99 apiece.

But instead, Renate Smart of Reseda was attracted to a red suede belt for under $2. She had a dress in mind she hoped it would go with.

Then, unable to withdraw with her pocketbook still intact, Smart joined a small crowd in jewelry. After intently examining rings, necklaces and trinkets, she put a large silver brooch under the magnifying glass to inspect an inlaid swan.

“Doesn’t it look like a Lalique?” the crisply dressed Smart asked in a European inflection. “It’s not, but it’s handmade. It’s got an artist’s name. It’s unusual. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

She had the sales clerk wrap it in a plastic bag. Total for the shopping spree? $15.98.

You don’t get bargains like that every day.

Smart was one of the thousands of value-seekers who showed up at Goodwill Industries’ Valley plant Saturday for the opening day of the annual Preferred Merchandise Sale.

All year long, as donated goods come in, Goodwill’s marketing specialists set aside the rare finds: antiques, china, fur, beaded gowns, silk ties and collectibles.

An antiques dealer helps price the goods at a cut below fair market value. Then, in a pair of two-day merchandising binges, it all goes up for sale.

This year’s sale began two weekends ago at Goodwill’s main headquarters on San Fernando Road in northeast Los Angeles. When the doors opened at 9 a.m. Saturday at the Valley plant next to the Department of Public Social Services on Lanark Street, hundreds of shoppers were waiting.

“Everybody wants to get in the door first,” said Tracy Powers, director of sales and marketing for Goodwill of Southern California. “We couldn’t get the door open.”

The memorable items were gone in a flash: a six-piece setting of Spode dinnerware sold for $84.99, a pre-World War II Rolex watch for $1,000 and a three-quarter-length sable jacket, slightly coming apart at the seams, for $500.

“All somebody has to do is take it to a furrier and they’ll have a jacket worth tens of thousands of dollars,” Powers said.

By noon, the bargain-basement crush had dissipated to a Nordstrom-like calm as about 20 milled about quietly. You couldn’t sell a baseball card to this crowd, but the two jewelry counters stayed busy all day long.

Michael Sills and his companion, Jeannie White, spent 20 minutes picking five silver rings and a silver necklace out of the hundreds of items on display.

“My daughters are going to be happy,” said Sills, a Van Nuys machine shop owner and confessed thrift-shop junkie. “Last year I bought them leather jackets.”

Then White spotted three small pewter locomotives priced at $15 apiece and grabbed one impulsively.

“It’s Merry Christmas to Iowa,” the transplanted Midwesterner said. “I have friends who collect pewter. I know they don’t have any trains.”

She figured she’d pay three times as much for them from a catalogue.

“It’s fun more than anything else,” Smart said, clutching her two carefully chosen purchases. “If you go to a department store, every one has the same thing at the same season. Here, it’s like a treasure hunt.”

Treasure hunters put $21,000 into the register Saturday. The sale resumes today at 10 a.m.

Even if you missed the three-quarter-length sable jacket, there’s still a rack of fur and plenty of unexpected finds, like a Body Glove one-piece wet suit for $99.99.