Make Quick Cash Selling Your Kid’s Old Clothes

One of my favorite ways to sell my kid’s old clothes is on Facebook BST groups (that’s “Buy, Sell, & Trade” for those in the know).

Selling kids clothes is a great way to get some cash for fun “extra” things.  In fact, last year I used the money I made from selling old clothes to pay for a house rental for a New Year’s getaway!

Sure you could list items on Facebook Marketplace, craigslist, or local groups – but then you have to worry about scheduling a time to meet up.  Selling on Ebay is convenient – but then they take a significant portion of any profits.

Yep, selling on Facebook BST groups is definitely the way to go…. IF you know what you’re doing.  If you don’t, it’s easy to flop.

Luckily, I’ve mastered it and can share my secrets.  Learn from me, in the beginning I wasted HOURS of my life trying to sell clothes only to end up with a measly $3.

This post has lots of important info – it’s definitely a good one to pin now so you can reference it in the future.

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Make Sure You Have the Right Gear

The good news is that you don’t need to invest in much before you can start selling and raking in the cash money.

First, you’ll need a scale designed for weighing mail.  The ACCUTECK Postal Scale is a great model because it’s cheap and weighs very specifically (you want it to give fractions of an ounce).

You don’t technically need a scale but it is sort of crazy not to use one for 2 reasons:

• Having your own scale allows you to ship through Paypal (which I’ll talk about when I explain shipping later) and those rates are CHEAPER than if you were to take it to the post office
• Having a scale allows you to mail things at night from your home while you’re wearing PJs and watching Netflix. Why would you voluntarily want to find time to visit the Post Office??

Second, you’ll need poly mailers.  I recommend the size 10×13 inch envelopes because it holds a good number of children’s outfits.  A bigger one would hold more, BUT the problem is it will get too heavy and you won’t be able to mail it *first class priority* (more on shipping later and why that’s important).

You probably have the rest of the things you need already, but I’ll list them all out just in case.

• Shipping Tape
  
• Printer (I have the Canon PIXMA PRO-100 Professional Photo Printer because I also use it to print out our holiday cards that end up looking better than the ones I used to pay a fortune for)
• Optional: Self Adhesive Shipping Labels (this makes your life easier, but you could also just print the labels on regular paper and tape them).
• Optional: Ziploc Bags (to protect the clothes inside the poly mailer in case it accidentally gets damaged)

Describe and Take Pictures of Your Items

First thing to do is take individual pictures of all the items you want to sell.

Pick a neutral background (I like to lay items down on my hardwood floor) near a window so you can use the natural light.  The colors will turn out so much better if you don’t have to use your flash.

After you are done take a little bit of time to edit each photo so it looks nice.  Nothing fancy, just make sure it’s cropped properly and that the contrast/color is adjusted so you can see details of the clothing.

Put together a description for each item in a word file.  You’ll want to include the following info:

• Brand
• Size
• Brief description (ex. “Green/navy plaid shirt”)
• Condition (New With Tags/NWT, New Without Tags/NWOT, Excellent Used Condition/EUC, Good Used Condition/GUC, Play condition)
• Price

Put Thought Into What You’re Selling

Currently in my storage closet I have gently-used kids clothes ranging in size from newborn to 4T, both boys and girls, and in multiple seasons.  There’s no way I would list that all in one post.  Let me tell you why:

From a buyer’s prospective…

Buyers are usually looking something specific, like girls summer clothes in size 18 months.   If you’ve listed 300+ items of different genders, sizes, and seasons – they’ll spend a couple seconds looking for what they want and when they don’t see it, they’ll move on.

From a seller’s prospective…

Putting together a sale post can be time consuming and take hours.  Selling too many items at once can be hard to keep track of and kill your entire night.

Here are my best tips for grouping items together for selling:

• Sell one gender of clothing at a time in a limited size range (example, Boys 18-24 months). While this may attract less buyers because it’s more specific, the potential buyers will be more serious and likely to actually purchase.
• Be mindful of the season. I always like to sell clothes BEFORE the season has hit.  This means I start selling fall/winter clothes in August, Christmas items in October, and summer clothes in February.  People like to buy early so they’re prepared.  It also means you have less competition because you’re ahead of the game.
• Have a good mix of “nice” items and “cheaper” items. I usually have an equal ratio of nice, casual, and play clothes.

Find Some BST Groups

To find groups to sell in, simply search in Facebook.  Use keywords like “BST” and “resale” to find them.  There are groups for different genders, brands, and price ranges.

Just to get your search started, these are some groups I’m currently members of:

• Upscale Resale $20 & Under(Mud Pie, Rare Editions and More)!
• Girls ONLY Brand Name BST
• Gymboree, Crazy 8 plus more $2 and under group
• Boys ONLY Brand Name Resale

You’ll likely have to submit a request to join a group.  Once you’ve been accepted I recommend reading the rules (you can usually find these in a pinned post).  Many of the groups are very similar but some have a few differences.

Some groups have rules specifying how many items you can have listed for sale at once, special items you are able to promote on special days, or additional requirements.

One of the most important differences to pay attention to is how shipping is required to be listed.  Some require shipping to be included in the price, some will let you say that you will add exact shipping fees, and yet others say you can set shipping prices in the sales post (ex. $3.00 first item shipped then $0.50 for each additional).

Pay attention to the rules!  If you break them the admin can delete your entire sales post without warning.

List Everything and Get Ready for the Cash!

You’ve compiled your descriptions and photos – now it’s time to put them out there!

Start by either finding a cute photo of your child wearing one of the outfits you’re selling or creating a photo collage of some of the items.

Create a new “sale” post, like this:

Make sure to include what items you’ll be listing, and be specific (ie. Girls Summer Clothes 18-24 months).  Also specify things like what brands you’ll be selling, if shipping is included in the price, if you’ll allow holds, if your house has pets, etc.  I also like to add that I ship immediately and like people to claim items by replying to photos.

Here’s an example of one of my sale posts:

Here’s one where I made a collage:

To list individual items, comment on your post.  One comment per item.

If someone is interested in an items, they’ll leave their Paypal e-mail address as a reply.

Collecting the Monies – Invoicing & Shipping

When someone claims an item by listing their Paypal e-mail, the first thing you do is send them an invoice.

To do this, simple log into your Paypal account and the option to send an invoice should be on the first screen:

NEVER request funds as being sent to “Friends or Family”.  While this option is nice because it doesn’t charge a fee, it is strictly forbidden on BST groups because it holds less accountability.

Once the buyer has paid your invoice, you’ll then have the option to ship.

The shipping screen will look like this:

Make sure the following options are selected:

Carrier name – USPS

Service type – First-Class Mail Parcel service (2-5 days)

Package type – Package/Thick Envelope

Put the item/s that have been purchased in the poly mailer (as I mentioned earlier, it’s usually a good idea to put them in another bag first, like a Ziploc, just to protect against accidental damage).

Then you just weigh your package (this is where the postal scale comes in super handy) and click the button that says “Calculate Shipping Cost”.

First-Class Mail is the cheapest way to ship items 16 ounces or less.

If it weighs more than 1 pound, it’s usually best to ship with flat rate envelopes or boxes.  These items are FREE from USPS.com, so go ahead and stock up now.  Hint – the padded flat rate envelopes are MUCH better for shipping clothes than the regular envelopes.

Once you’ve paid for the shipping, print our your shipping label and affix it to the poly mailer.  Next time you hit that 10 second break between Netflix episodes, run out to your mailbox and put the package inside before the next show starts.

And that’s it – that’s how you sell on BST groups. 

Remember that all those transactions can add up fast.  So what are you waiting for?  Get out there and make lots of money!

Don’t forget to pin this so you can reference it again later!

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