Clothing Swap

I attended my first clothing swap this weekend. It was a ton of fun! I felt it went very well, so I thought I would share the idea with all of you. The intent of a clothing swap is to basically exchange clothes that you own which are no longer your style or no longer fit you for someone else’s clothes in your size and style. And it doesn’t have to be just clothes- We had shoes, purses, costume jewelry, unopened panty hose, accessories, etc.

I found out about the clothing swap on an online mommy’s forum I belong to, that is specific to my area. We all decided it was time to clean out our closets, and what better way to do that than to donate to each other! So we all got together at 10am Saturday and brought all of our unwanted clothes (that were still on good-excellent condition). Because there were only about 8 of us, we just decided to put the clothes in a basic order from small to large, in piles according to who brought them. We made signs for our piles that stated what we had brought. For example, mine said “Shirts S, M, L, Jeans size 8, Skirts size 2-9, Capris size 4-9, necklaces”. Then we all dove in! The general rule was to not take more than you brought. We picked out things we liked, then took them to the woman’s restroom to try them on. The church had nice, single person rooms with chairs and long mirrors, which was an absolute plus. If this is not available for your swap, perhaps you could suggest people wear camis and bike shorts so they can try things on. Once things died down, we “closed” the swap, and everyone was able to take home their “new” clothes and the things they had brought that no one wanted (we also gave the option to donate them). I ended up taking home at least 12 new items of clothing from Gap dark wash jeans to a cute black Old Navy sweater. And all for the cost of the gas to get there and back!

There are many ways you can organize a clothing swap. If it were a larger crowd of people you don’t really know, you could all meet together and then arrange “swapping times” for people to pair off and swap their clothes. If you chose this method you could pair people with others who have what they are looking for. Then give them an allotment of time to swap, and a limit of how many items they can take (so that others have a chance as well). Or, if you really are going to have a TON of people (like a church wide event or something) everyone would donate, then all items would be hung according to size and people would get tickets to take as many things as they brought. This one might be a weekend event where people come and go during specified hours. Who knows! There are tons of possibilities, I’m sure you can find a great way to make this work for you and your friends! You could even host one for children’s clothes, men’s clothes, or have specialized swaps for working or pregnant moms.

I hope some of you will try out this idea- And I’d love to hear how it goes! Please post any questions you have as a comment, and I will do my best to answer them.

Here’s to living- Happier, Healthier, more FRUGAL lives!

~Frugalmegan~