Annette Craig, a regular at the Barn at St. Thomas Whitemarsh’s monthly flea market, is proud to announce that she paid $1 for the J. Crew pants she’s wearing. She got them at the Salvation Army. They still had the tag attached.

“They’re very well loved, as you can see,” she says, twirling to show them off.

U.S. secondhand apparel sales grew 14% in 2024, five times faster than the overall apparel market, according to ThredUp’s 2025 Resale Report, part of a boom that also pushed Good- will to a record $7 billion in revenue last year.

“My own 22-year-old daughter refuses to buy new clothes. All she does is go to thrift stores, because it’s cheaper and also because she believes it’s more ecological,” says Jim Weiss, a retired art history professor who’s run the Barn’s sale since 2017.

The appeal isn’t the same for everyone. A flea market vendor selling $250 ties for $10 presents a different experience than the boutique owner curating her selection, or the shopkeeper trying to make secondhand work for every size. In the Northwest Philadelphia region, you don’t have to go far to find all three — whether it’s a stall in Whitemarsh or storefronts in Chestnut Hill, Germantown, and Roxborough.

The flea market

The Barn at St. Thomas Whitemarsh, which grew out of the old church Country Fair into a popular monthly sale, has been booming ever since Covid. It now includes 12 departments, staffed by 130 volunteers.

“All you have to do is check out the parking lot,” says Jim. “By 9 a.m. there’s never anywhere left to park. I joke about it with my pastor. ‘Wouldn’t you like to have this problem on Sunday morning?’”

That volume has a real impact on profits, which the church donates to charity. Last year, all eight Barn sales together took in about $225,000.

“Imagine that! I can’t believe we make $30,000 in four hours, just selling used shirts, books, toys and furniture,” he says. “It’s now at the point where I sign my letters to the group ‘Loaves and Fishes Jim.’”

They’ve also learned how to take advantage of the good stuff when it comes in. Jim gets help pricing exceptional items from volunteers who are experts in their field, and has worked out a deal with Freeman’s Auction House (now called Hindman’s) for when something has serious value. “They’re kind of amused by us,” he says.

One time they got an edition of the first Hebrew Bible printed in America, from 1814, which sold for $6,000. “Then two years ago we got a booklet of 120 watercolors of Russian peasants and fisherwomen and soldiers from the 1867 Paris World’s Fair, which turned out to be the work of an obscure realist painter named J.M. Heuser,” Jim says. “It sold for $8,500.”

Both times, the auction house waived its seller’s fee and the Barn kept the full amount.

The storefronts

Brand names carried real weight in the early 2000s, when the latest styles of Juicy Couture and Von Dutch were status symbols as much as they were clothes. "Mean Girls" and "The Devil Wears Prada" both mined that snobbery for laughs. "Lady Bird" took it more seriously, featuring a girl at the register of a Salvation Army who wished she had her classmates’ money. Then came a decade of cheap fast fashion at H&M and Forever 21, then in 2016 "Stranger Things" sent shoppers after mom jeans and scrunchies. The 2020s brought a 1990s revival and a pandemic that pushed people to online vintage at Depop and Mercari. By the time TikTok got hold of the trend, chasing something from an earlier decade wasn’t a niche habit anymore. It was mainstream.

At Windfall Gallery in Chestnut Hill, Cynthia Fillmore figured she’d try vintage during the summer season, just to see. It’s worked so well she plans to stick with it.

“I got the best feedback from my customers, everybody was thrilled,” she says. “My shopper has typically been a more mature woman who’s a professional. Now I’m seeing whole families, mothers and daughters coming in, and they’re both shopping together.”

Cynthia chalks it up to the economy. “Everything costs a million dollars nowadays, and just to put food on your table is breaking your budget.” But her customers also like keeping good clothing out of the landfill. “People are all about repurposing, recycling, and sustainability,” she says.

Finally, she says, there’s a bucket of shoppers who’ve been taking GLP-1 weight-loss drugs who come in needing to replace their entire wardrobe. “Believe me, that’s a real thing.”

Further down Germantown Avenue, Bargain Thrift is a great place for vintage everything, and has become particularly popular among younger shoppers.

“Their interest is driven by fashion, as they’re looking for vintage pieces that are one of a kind,” says Sarah Shannon, who bought the store two years ago. “They also appreciate the break from online shopping, and the one-click Amazon experience.”

But mostly, Sarah says, it’s about money. “Secondhand, typically, we’re selling at about 20% of its original retail value. So you just can’t beat it in terms of sticking to a budget.”

Sarah sources most of her stock from clothing drives run by school groups and community organizations. Every once in a while, she says, they get something unusual. Last week it was a working vintage neon Marlboro sign, the kind of thing that rarely survives intact. She sold it for $70.

“It’s really hard to find those intact and still working,” Sarah says. “This one was flawless, completely pristine.”

Poppy & Bean’s owner Jenna Coiro bought her Roxborough store recently too, and she’s had a similar success.

“Keeping prices low works really well for Poppy & Bean,” she says. “Vintage earrings for $8? A pair of fun pants for $22? You can leave the shop with a whole new outfit for under $50, and I think that is something that keeps customers returning.”

But accessibility is about more than just price, Jenna says. There’s also size, as vintage styles weren’t usually made for larger people. “I always try to be size inclusive,” she says. “This is a problem for many plus-size people, and I don’t want anyone to ever feel excluded.”

Her shop carries a mix of housewares, clothing and locally made goods from people in the neighborhood. Inventory turns over quickly, with new items filling the shelves and racks each week.

“I always hear ‘my mom had this,’ or ‘my grandma used these,’ or ‘I wore this when I was a teenager,’” Jenna says of her shoppers. “That is something I’ll never tire of hearing.”

The thrill of the hunt

Thrifting is a game as much as it is a way to shop, and the real prize isn’t always the discount.

“It’s the thrill of the hunt,” says Cynthia. “There’s nothing like that ‘aha!’ feeling you get when you see something you’ve been looking for, or something of really great quality. Even better when you find it new with the tag still on it.”

Annette agrees. She loves being able to re-upholster old chairs with found fabric, or turn curtains into tablecloths.

“Things are getting used again, and not winding up in a landfill,” she says. “Thrifting is really the greatest form of recycling.”

Her favorite story might be one of her first. It happened when her kids were still young, and she’d been searching for a wooden play kitchen that, at the time, retailed new for about $150.

“I found it for $5,” she says. “All it needed was a good scrub down, which my kids and I did together out in our driveway.”

Even that wasn’t the end of the story for that particular kitchen. The family eventually passed it on to friends. When those kids outgrew it too, they gave it back.

“We wound up selling it at a yard sale for $20,” she says.