I was at Gabriel's place so I had to hurriedly wake up and rush off. He was feeling mighty generous from last night's killer pot so I had a happy ride home courtesy of him!
I was supremely worried about the flea because me and my sister, while repacking, found a shit ton of stuff we wanted to rid. The top sellers in Lucky Plaza flea markets are bags and shoes and we had such a pittance of both that we were sure we were screwed.
This is the total loot we brought:
My sister and her fingers are the crassest things.
1. 4 bursting full luggages of 2nd hand clothes
2. 1 carrier of shoes
3. 4 plastic bags of aunt's/ uncle's 2nd hand clothes
4. 2 duffel bags of bags and accessories
5. 1 box of accessories
I could migrate at a moment's notice with the amount of shit we brought.
Now, me and my sister are flea markets veterans. We have been hosting booths since their inception in 2011. Over the years, our strategies kept changing due to the location shifts. It was first *SCAPE underground, then *SCAPE Level 4, then Lucky Plaza.
The prices over the years dropped while rent soared. We cut down from bimonthly fleas to yearly fleas. Even then, the profits dwindled so much that the idea of a flea market started turning us off. We only went this time because our wardrobes were truly exploding.
This time, my aunt, grandma and uncle joined us. I know, I know, I had the most fucking supportive family ever. Willing to encourage the stripper in me (probably not their intention when they set up the pole) and willing to bear through throngs of pinoys for me.
I made my grandma and aunt hang around a table to chope the seat while me, my sister and uncle stayed in the queue. I loved my spot and I was certain we would make some sales.
In a twist of events, we ended up queueing at the wrong spot. The facilitator took one look at my email and directed me towards the new flea location beside Jolibee. I went into a state of small shock and started sending panicky texts to my aunt telling her to chope one at the new location instead.
My sister was originally optimistic while I was pessimistic, but by now she joined me in my misery. We started wondering the crowd wouldn't come in from the more popular flea to this one, which she remarked look more expensive so it could be a turn off.
My aunt whatsapped us a photo of them reserving a table at our new location. Our booth seemed obscured by a black curtain against an empty, crowdless space and and I was thinking yep we are fucked.
In the end, this place turned out to be the greatest mistake ever!
Immediately when we went in, because we had a shit ton of space and were near the beginning of the weekend booth area, customers started to swarm us helping us open luggages and bags just to see our wares. My aunt managed bags, shoes and accessories, my sister managed clothes, my grandma managed cash and I managed bulk sales.
At one point, I had a customer who got along so well with me that she started showing me photos of her daughters and we fawned over how adorable they were together, her genuinely and me because both daughters looked like giant walking dollar signs. Kidding, they looked cute really.
To disclaim, I truly am sincere with people, that's why the aforementioned lady brought $50's worth of stuff from me within 3 minutes and that's also why a duo of friends who couldn't fit into anything they tried on brought everything they tried in the end because we ended up chatting like old pals.
But I can also be a living bitch to those who don't deserve my kindness.
This one lady tried to threaten buying nothing from my sister over a $3 discount and I managed the deal off her hands, agreeing to the discount and telling her to "死在家里" as I passed her the change, explaining that's Chinese for have a nice day.
So anyway, I truly do think all four of us have a functional dynamic going on because we ended up recuperating our rent and float within two hours. I think we helmed top sales on the ground.
The stall holders next to us were bitching when a lady tried on their clothes and opposite us, the stall holders were just reclining in their seats and not giving too much of a hoot.
That's a big deal because over at my side, all 4 of us haven't had a inch of water in three hours because the crowd didn't ebb and continued standing up for the full six hours, saving the seat for my grandma and to store our stuff.
Gabriel came over at around 3pm and in his adorably comical way, started dragging people to our booth. But me and my aunt both noticed that whenever he was around (he walked off a lot, distracted by noise), our crowd would plunge. So I kept tasking him with stuff (buy lunch, smoke more, etc)
By about 5pm, we were ready to leave because miraculously, from the original ever-climbing mountain of clothes and smattering of stocks all displayed on the ground, we have been reduced to just a simple small table of less than 20 pieces of clothing.
We headed to Christ the King to drop off our unsold, aka sincere donations bless us Mother Mary, and me and my sister started counting our profits.
And we made a whooping SGD$390!
This is excluding our $107 rent and $180 float. So in total, we actually made $677 in sales.
It was so unprecedented and I kept recounting to make sure I wasn't delusional after a long day of starvation and deprivation. But it turned out legit so for the first time in a long time, me and my sister finally re-crossed the $500 sales mark in just 5 hours of non-stop work.
Ah man. So satisfying. Not better than sex, but almost.
So satisfying.
My sister and I tried to scam my mum into thinking we sold nothing and came home with full luggages, so that she'd help us bring the luggages in and realize they're empty and we get to go "WE SOLD IT ALL WHOOP WHOOP bet you I can sell my kidney too".
But we forgot that we had our donation clause because when we put our glum faces on and said we sold nothing, she went on to say, "Never sell anything? Never mind at least you donated it all," and our story quickly loopholed and our lie fell apart :(
What a deeeeeply satisfying day.
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