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A white elephant sale is a collection of used items being sold, much akin to a yard sale or garage sale, often as a fund-raiser for a cause.
A garage sale is an informal event for the sale of used goods by private individuals, in which sellers are not required to obtain business licenses or collect sales tax.
The term "white elephant" refers to an extravagant but burdensome gift that cannot be easily disposed of, based on the legend of the King of Siam gifting rare albino elephants to courtiers who had displeased him, that they might be ruined by the animals' upkeep costs. [1]
A white elephant is a possession which its owner cannot dispose of and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is an object, building project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc., considered expensive but without use or value.
A courtier is a person who is often in attendance at the court of a monarch or other royal personage. The earliest historical examples of courtiers were part of the retinues of rulers. Historically the court was the centre of government as well as the residence of the monarch, and the social and political life were often completely mixed together.
A "white elephant sale" sells items that retain some value but have no intrinsic use; items are often referred to as white elephants. Such items may still find buyers but their resale value is hard to estimate.
White elephant sales are typically organized by non-profit organizations such as churches and schools to raise money for a charity cause or a special occasion like Easter or Mother's Day. They operate in a manner similar to many non-profit thrift shops. Members or friends of the organization holding the white elephant sale will donate old items which they no longer use, or otherwise no longer care to own.
Easter, also called Pascha or Resurrection Sunday, is a festival and holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in the New Testament as having occurred on the third day after his burial following his crucifixion by the Romans at Calvary c. 30 AD. It is the culmination of the Passion of Jesus, preceded by Lent, a 40-day period of fasting, prayer, and penance.
Mother's Day is a celebration honoring the mother of the family, as well as motherhood, maternal bonds, and the influence of mothers in society. It is celebrated on various days in many parts of the world, most commonly in the months of March or May. It complements similar celebrations honoring family members, such as Father's Day, Siblings Day, and Grandparents Day.
After items have been collected, a sale will be held, usually lasting more than one day in a public fête style. Volunteers often run checkouts, and organize the items to be sold. Items are sold at low prices, as many are obsolete, or useful to only certain people, and would not otherwise be sold.
White elephant sales are often useful to buyers and collectors, because they provide a way to purchase older and harder to find items. In the days before online auction and trading websites, white elephant sales, along with thrift stores, yard sales and pawn shops were popular ways to procure collectibles and odd items not available in retail stores.
Problems can arise with white elephant sales in that a great deal of space is required to hold items to be sold. Even more problematic is many items will not be sold one year, but in the case of an annual sale, will be retained to be sold the next year. This requires a large amount of space to be dedicated to the extended storage of the items.
Other problems include the inability to move merchandise, or the little money produced by the sale, despite its low (or nonexistent) initial investment. Additionally, many items donated are often not worth selling, as they are broken, or clearly worthless, and donated only so the previous owner can dispense with them.
White elephant sales also often carry the reputation of selling kitsch items.
Kitsch, also called cheesiness or tackiness, is art or other objects that, generally speaking, appeal to popular rather than "high art" tastes. Such objects are sometimes appreciated in a knowingly ironic or humorous way. The word was first applied to artwork that was a response to certain divisions of 19th-century art with aesthetics that favored what later art critics would consider to be exaggerated sentimentality and melodrama. Hence, 'kitsch art' is closely associated with 'sentimental art'. Kitsch is also related to the concept of camp, because of its humorous and ironic nature.
A pawnbroker is an individual or business that offers secured loans to people, with items of personal property used as collateral. The items having been pawned to the broker are themselves called pledges or pawns, or simply the collateral. While many items can be pawned, pawnshops typically accept jewelry, musical instruments, home audio equipment, computers, video game systems, coins, gold, silver, televisions, cameras, power tools, firearms, and other relatively valuable items as collateral.
A convenience store, convenience shop, or corner store is a small retail business that stocks a range of everyday items such as groceries, snack foods, confectionery, soft drinks, tobacco products, over-the-counter drugs, toiletries, newspapers, and magazines. In some jurisdictions, convenience stores are licensed to sell alcohol, typically beer and wine. Such stores may also offer money order and wire transfer services, along with the use of a fax machine or photocopier for a small per-copy cost. They differ from general stores and village shops in that they are not in a rural location and are used as a convenient supplement to larger stores.
Shopping is an activity in which a customer browses the available goods or services presented by one or more retailers with the potential intent to purchase a suitable selection of them. A typology of shopper types has been developed by scholars which identifies one group of shoppers as recreational shoppers, that is, those who enjoy shopping and view it as a leisure activity.
Retail is the process of selling consumer goods or services to customers through multiple channels of distribution to earn a profit. Retailers satisfy demand identified through a supply chain. The term "retailer" is typically applied where a service provider fills the small orders of a large number of individuals, who are end-users, rather than large orders of a small number of wholesale, corporate or government clientele. Shopping generally refers to the act of buying products. Sometimes this is done to obtain final goods, including necessities such as food and clothing; sometimes it takes place as a recreational activity. Recreational shopping often involves window shopping and browsing: it does not always result in a purchase.
In marketing, a coupon is a ticket or document that can be redeemed for a financial discount or rebate when purchasing a product.
A charity shop or thrift shop is a retail establishment run by a charitable organization to raise money. Charity shops are a type of social enterprise. They sell mainly used goods such as clothing, books, music albums, DVDs, and furniture donated by members of the public, and are often staffed by volunteers. Because the items for sale were obtained for free, and business costs are low, the items can be sold at competitive prices. After costs are paid, all remaining income from the sales is used in accord with the organization's stated charitable purpose. Costs include purchase and/or depreciation of fixtures, operating costs and the building lease or mortgage.
In the broadest sense, merchandising is any practice which contributes to the sale of products to a retail consumer. At a retail in-store level, merchandising refers to the variety of products available for sale and the display of those products in such a way that it stimulates interest and entices customers to make a purchase.
Savers, Inc. headquartered in Bellevue, Washington, US, is a privately held for-profit thrift store chain offering second hand shopping. An international company, Savers has more than 315 locations throughout the United States, Canada and Australia, and receives its merchandise by paying money to non-profit organizations for donated clothing and household items, and through direct donation by individuals. Savers is known as Value Village in the Pacific Northwest of the US and most of Canada, and Village des Valeurs in Quebec. In Australia and other regions of the US, the stores share the corporation's name.
A secondhand or used good is a piece of personal property that is being purchased by or otherwise transferred to a second or later end user. A used good can also simply mean it is no longer in the same condition as it was when transferred to the current owner. When the term used means that an item has expended its purpose, it is typically called garbage, instead.
A gift shop or souvenir shop is a store primarily selling souvenirs, memorabilia, and other items relating to a particular topic or theme. The items sold often include coffee mugs, stuffed animals, t-shirts, postcards, handmade collections and other souvenirs. Gift shops are normally found in areas visited by many tourists. Hotels and motels in Canada and the United States often feature a gift shop near their entrance. Venues such as zoos, aquariums, national parks, theme parks, and museums have their own gift shops as well; in some cases these shops sell items of higher value than gift shops not associated with a venue, as well as trinkets. These stores are sometimes a source of financial support for educational institutions.
A fence, also known as a receiver, mover, or moving man, is an individual who knowingly buys stolen goods in order to later resell them for profit. The fence acts as a middleman between thieves and the eventual buyers of stolen goods who may not be aware that the goods are stolen. As a verb, the word describes the behaviour of the thief in the transaction: The burglar fenced the stolen radio. This sense of the term came from thieves' slang, first attested c. 1700, from the notion of such transactions providing a defence against being caught. The term remains in common use in all major dialects of modern English, all of which spell it with a "c" even though the source word in some dialects is now spelled defense.
A jumble sale, bring and buy sale or rummage sale is an event at which second hand goods are sold, usually by an institution such as a local Boys' Brigade Company, Scout group, or church, as a fundraising or charitable effort. A rummage sale by a church is called a church sale or white elephant sale, frequently as part of a church bazaar.
Consignment is the act of consigning, the act of giving over to another person or agent's charge, custody or care any material or goods but retaining legal ownership until the material or goods are sold. That may be done for the purpose of shipping the goods, transferring the goods to auction or intending the goods to be placed on sale in a store.
Gifts in kind, also referred to as in-kind donations, is a kind of charitable giving in which, instead of giving money to buy needed goods and services, the goods and services themselves are given. Gifts in kind are distinguished from gifts of cash or stock. Some types of gifts in kind are appropriate, others are not. Examples of in-kind gifts include goods like food, clothing, medicines, furniture, office equipment, and building materials. Performance of services, such as building an orphanage, providing office space or offering administrative support, may also be counted as in-kind gifts.
A closeout or clearance sale is a discount sale of inventory either by retail or wholesale. It may be that a product is not selling well, or that the retailer is closing because of relocation, a fire, over-ordering, or especially because of bankruptcy. In the latter case, it is usually known as a going-out-of-business sale or liquidation sale, and is part of the process of liquidation. A hail sale is a closeout at a car dealership after hail damage.
A catalog merchant is a form of retailing. The typical merchant sells a wide variety of household and personal products, with many emphasizing jewelry. Unlike a self-serve retail store, most of the items are not displayed; customers select the products from printed catalogs in the store and fill out an order form. The order is brought to the sales counter, where a clerk retrieves the items from the warehouse area to a payment and checkout station.
A second-hand shop is a shop which sells goods that are not new.
Average prices represent, quite simply, total sales revenue divided by total units sold. Many products, however, are sold in multiple variants, such as bottle sizes. In these cases, managers face a challenge: they must determine 'comparable' units. Average prices can be calculated by weighting different unit selling prices by the percentage of unit sales (mix) for each product variant. If we use a standard, rather than an actual mix of sizes and product varieties, the result is price per statistical unit. Statistical units are also known as equivalent units.
In business, a trojan horse is an advertising offer made by a company that is designed to draw potential customers by offering them cash or something of value for acceptance, but following acceptance, the buyer is forced to spend a much larger amount of money, either by being signed into a lengthy contract, from which exit is difficult, or by having money automatically drawn in some other method. The harmful consequences faced by the customer may include spending far above market rate, large amount of debt, or identity theft.