Auntie Kate The Resale Expert

Somewhere, I once heard that American English is the only language with the phrase “making money”. That’s what came to mind whenone consignment shop owner who attended the NARTS Conference said she heard resalers of all types making comments like:

“I don’t think it’s fair to buy something from someone for $1 and sell it for $6.”

How that rankles me! This is the point of trade: you find/ create/ make something, you make it worth more money, you put it in front of an audience who might be interested in it and you offer it freely to those who want it. If someone thinks it’s worth MORE than their six dollars, they’ll trade you your asking price in money for the item. If not, they won’t. So what’s “fair”?

In Atlas Shrugged, one of the heroes, Francisco d’Anconia, gives a speech on the meaning of money. In it he says: “The words ‘to make money’ hold the essence of human morality.” His reason is that one makes money through production and trade. And that is the noblest way to live: as a producer who creates value and then gains values from others through voluntary exchange. Reference

Our correspondent was honest enough to admit that once upon a time [I was] always afraid of the word profit, thinking that I had to do everyone a favor, and that being fair meant cutting my profit. What’s fair about undervaluing your own work and worth? “Fair” involves two people: the buyer and the seller in a willing exchange of value. If you aren’t a monopoly, the buyer can always not buy if a price is not “fair” to her. Just as a seller doesn’t have to sell unless she can receive what, to her, is fair value on her investment.

Another way “fair” will ruin your business, an earlier post where we talk about what’s “fair”, and I conclude with “Do what is best for your consignors/ sellers/ donors: that is, what makes your business thrive. After all, it’s not fair that your shop should go out of business, and that your suppliers and customers should be left high-and-dry. That wouldn’t be, umm…. nice?”

On opening day in my shop, a friend gave me a brass plaque. It reads Profit is not a dirty word. I was there to make a profit, and I CREATED value in my goods. After all, the resale shopkeeper’s motto is “What’s it worth hanging in the back of your closet or under a dust cover in the spare bedroom? Nothing, right?”

Making money demands our best, and … no apology is needed for achievement and excellence.

Any shopkeeper, resale or not, who feels apologetic that she obtains the right goods, offers them in the right atmosphere to the right customers, and sells them at a price the buyer is willing and even happy to pay… should be the proud proprietor of a creation all her own: her shop.

I repeat, and hope that my resale shopkeepers truly understand this: The noblest way to live [is] as a producer who creates value and then gains values from others through voluntary exchange.

And to that person who obtained an item for resale for a single dollar and who created a market for the same item at $6? Mazel tov, and many more! You’re on the right track…MAKING money.