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Discover Mid-America — June 2006
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Flea marketing
with my kid
by Bruce Rodgers, Editor/Publisher
A couple of weekends ago I spent most of a Sunday at a flea market at Sentimental Journey in Olathe, KS. I wasn’t buying; I was selling. And since it was (yes folks it’s true) the first time I had ever sold at a flea market, I had to ask if there were any limitations on what I could sell.
“Anything as long as it’s legal,” was the answer I got from one of the clerks at the mall.
The cost was $10 for two parking slots in front to the mall. I figured I could easily make that up with all the stuff I had in my garage plus a few things from the office.
I warned my teenage son that he was going to help. He moaned and then acted, with a darkened look of despondency, as if his world had collapsed — as if he no longer had an I-Pod, computer, TV and access to his friends — when I added that it was an all-day effort, starting at 6:30 a.m. to give us plenty of time to get there and set up. Plus, he was going to help me sell.
To add to the burden, it turned out to be one of those wet, cold, overcast days in early May. With that, even I began to reconsider when I awoke that morning.
But we piled up the pickup and headed out. Typically teenagerish, my son didn’t bring a jacket so I lent him mine when we got there. Once unloaded, he sat down in a lawn chair, hood pulled up around his face as the drizzle fell, while I left to go get a second load and jacket for myself. Once I left, some of the other vendors — women vendors mostly — asked my son if he was doing okay. (Nothing like the feeling of being a worthless father when strangers inquire about your kid’s welfare once you’re out of sight.)
Meanwhile, I was at my house, 7:30 a.m. on a Sunday, attempting to follow the rule of “lift with your legs, not your back” as I loaded my pickup — alone — with more stuff.
Back in Olathe, the motherly concern had opened up my kid; that and the fact he had sold $7 worth while I was gone for 45 minutes. Obviously, a 15 year old with a forlorn look, while bundled against a cold drizzle, has the ability to spark a few sales.
Once I returned with more stuff and we spread it out in our designated space, it turned out that a lot of the stuff was my kid’s: three different bicycles, some baseball equipment and a fish tank with accessories.
Through the day, karma kicked in and most of his stuff sold.
I did manage to sell an old file cabinet from work, even borrowing a two-wheel from the mall to help load it. My want to assist could have been fear the buyer would reconsider — that $10 was too much.
The desk from work and the furniture from my garage got a ride back to their previous spot in existence. My son and I ended up with about $175 and a great memory of a father and son spending the day together.
Bruce Rodgers can be contacted at publisher@discoverypub.com.
> Editor’s Notebook Archive — past columns