Best time to hit up Goodwill?

[harper]

I need to move to a better part of the country where they have magical quantities of real games!

Well, don't move here. haha

[foxhound1022]

The Goodwill near us usually puts out the stuff for the next day in the hour before they close, so that is usually when we go. S.A. is normally a crap shoot, so we just pop in randomly.

[cookie monster]

If you go to places fairly often chat up employees. Tell them what you are looking for and they remember you hell, i slip people my number if it is a place i hit regular. Plus stop at any thrift store or road side yard sale cause you never know what could be there.

[FiftyDollarCurse]

Early in the morning on weekdays is what has worked the best for me. I have found good stuff at other times as well, but morning weekdays is much more consistent.

There are about 5 or 10 other very, very devoted thrift store shoppers I see every day at this time and I am very confident none of them are ever after old video games (predominanly old, presumably retired men).

Any other time of the day I know that my "competition" has probably already combed through the store. Any time during the weekend has always been fruitless to me. The stores are always way too crowded to do anything more than a cursory scan.

[jay_red]

I drive by a Goodwill on the way home from work, and stop there every other day (I feel that every day would make me look like a weirdo or some thing lol) at around 5 pm and its hit or miss, I have found some really good stuff, and nothing at all. You for sure need to look in the bins that have not been placed on the shelf though.

The other Goodwill stores I hit up on the weekends I try to get there early on Saturday but have not had any real luck lately. I have found some of my best finds in the middle of the week during an unexpected stop at one though.

[harper]

Yeah I usually only get to go like once a week these days. But I always check around the electronics, toys, books, and with cd/dvds/vhs (where the games are usually are). There was one time that I went with my mom and we were about to leave, but she saw someone coming out with a bin of stuff so she went to see if they had anything and she brought back a shoebox full of Super Nintendo stuff. I love days like that. haha

[Bikeage]

Normally I go around 2-5 pm, but it's always better to go early. Last summer I had morning business near the best local Goodwill, so I checked it out at 9am and found about twenty common 2600 and Genesis games laid out in a sad little thrift store display near the counter. During my usual times they would have been sold or scattered all over the store by then.

Even more importantly than what time you go is how often. Like a previous poster, I can't bring myself to be "the weird guy" who visits every day, but that's the dude whose making finds before you do. I occasionally pass on items worthy of picking just so see if they are still there when I visit a few days later, and they rarely are.

[Runefaust]

Any time, any day. At least that's the case with the Goodwill(s) by my place. My brother will go there in the morning, and I'll come around sometime in the afternoon and find something new they brought out after he had left, lol.

I'll never forget, this one time my younger bro went in the afternoon and told me there wasn't anything good that day. I went later in the evening and found a brand new Cooler Master HAF X Nvidia edition, with all the accessories intact. I got it for $50!!!! A $200+ full tower chasis for $50! Ironically my bro now owns that tower, lol, bought it off me for double what I paid at GW, which is still half of what the retail price was.

That an' a small library of Neo Geo AES cartridges (CIB MINTS!) were the best treasures I've found at my local GW shops.

[GameMasterGuy]

* For what you do find, make sure you pick it up and hang onto it while deciding if you want it. If you put it down while deciding it becomes fair game again.

This applies to all stores. As I was considering whether or not to get that Final Fantasy 7 movie despite liking 6 significantly better at the Borders "going out of business" sale, someone snatched it up.

[jay_red]

That an' a small library of Neo Geo AES cartridges (CIB MINTS!) were the best treasures I've found at my local GW shops.

curious as to what titles these were and how much, I have never found anything that sweet...yet