Daily Deal - American Way Thrift Store

For a while last year, I was on a real thrift store kick.  It all started when I was rummaging for sweaters to recycle for the yarn (more info on this to come during a later blog posting I'm sure).  One day I accidentally came across a depression glass vase and some collectible china which definitely got me on the thrifty kick for a while.

More recently, I haven't had as much time to spend hunting for treasures, but the American Way Thrift Store (Burbank, CA) is a 5 minute drive from my office.  When needing to get out of the corporate environment for a half hour, it's the perfect place to wander around.  I will say that it's not the most brightly lit or organized thrift store in the area.  The aisles are pretty tightly packed with stock, and it's the kind of place where you have to be willing to "dig" a little bit.  In order to rotate inventory, each week they offer a 50% discount on certain colored price tags.  They already have very reasonable prices compared to a lot of similar stores in the area, so this is just another benefit.  I've had some amazing luck in what I've found there (ask me about the $400 worth of wool and cotton yarns that I paid $30 for).  Today, I was definitely having one of those good thrifting days.

My first find was this spice rack.  When I first spotted it, I was a little unsure about the concept of buying a spice rack (with the spices in it).  After a quick call to the husband, who reminded me that we could always tip out the spices and put fresh ones in there, I decided that the $7 price tag was very reasonable for the storage component at least.  After getting it home, it turns out that of the 20 spice jars included, about 17 of them had brand new sealed spices in them!  Granted, I'm not sure how old the spices are, but after giving them a good sniff, I'm sure they're in good shape to use.  Our spice cabinet is so over run at this point, it's nice to have a simple and organized way to keep them out on the counter!


One con with this particular thrift store is that they have a $10 minimum for credit cards ($20 for debit cards).  As somebody who almost never carries cash on me, I had to find something to make up the $3 difference to buy the spice rack with.  The store often pre-packages similar items (i.e. stuffed animals, jewelry boxes etc.) together and assigns a bundle price.  I love checking that section to see what goodies they've put together and happened across a collection of scented Yankee candle tea lights/tarts that had been bagged together.  That was enough to put me above the minimum card limit and had me leaving a very happy camper indeed.  Now, if I could only figure out where in the house I've hidden my tart burner, it would be perfect!