The week before Christmas, Sarah and I ventured to a couple nearby sales.  The listings for this day were pretty slim, so our hopes for good treasures were low.  One listing said it was a warehouse sale that “welcomed dealers."  I figured this meant that things would be priced super cheap.  We normally hate warehouse sales (remember this?), but we decided it couldn’t hurt to go look.

The warehouse was owned by an estate sale company that obviously liquidates homes after a sale is over.  At first it seemed as though they were only selling literal garbage:

Expired Twinkies.  Yikes.

Actually, now that I think about it, I shouldn’t make fun of selling Twinkies.  When the whole Hostess bankruptcy thing happened, I TOTALLY BOUGHT SOME TWINKIES ON EBAY.  I had never had a Twinkie in my life, and was scared I never would.  I even had the audacity to complain to the ebay seller (and threaten negative feedback) because it took them over a week to mail my Twinkies.

Anyway, things at this sale started looking better when I spotted an old Pabst Blue Ribbon beer sign.  I knew that beer signs in general are collectible, and was pretty sure that PBR collectors are hardcore.

The sign is a giant 3D bartender guy made out of plastic.  He is so cool.  Probably from the 60s or 70s.

I asked the lady how much she wanted for him and she instantly launched into talking about how he is probably SO valuable and how she should probably put him on ebay and blah blah.  This is always a red flag.  If she wants to put him on ebay then he shouldn’t be in her heap of stuff for sale.  I stood there silently and then she said $25.  We settled on $20.  I figured an even twenty dollars was a good risk to take on this thing.  If it didn’t sell, I could survive a $20 loss.

But it did sell!  And for a lot!  When I put this guy up on ebay, he had bids within the first half hour.  And then he had 40 watchers!  I knew he had to be special.  He ended up selling for just over $90!

I was thrilled!  And what is even more exciting is that the lady had more of these…so maybe I will go buy the rest!

For more "Money Makers” click here!

-Erin