Portland’s Goodwill Blue Hanger Is Mildly Terrifying.

So like first of all, they don’t call it Blue Hanger out here; they call it “The Bins”. Sounds ominous as hell, right? “The Bins” could easily be the title of a Stephen King novel. Probably not a good one but hey, who even reads him anymore?

Anyway, the view from the bus stop as you try to figure out how the hell to get in there doesn’t help matters.

is this a thrift store or a prison camp?

Now I’m kind of a veteran of the old warehouse outlet stores if I must say so myself. Many moons ago, back in Austin, I used to work as an assistant to a certain local eccentric doll collector (now successful actress). A chunk of every other work day was set aside to scour the outlet store for hidden treasure. It was a lot of fun, if a bit chaotic.

If you’re completely unfamiliar to how these outlet stores work, hold onto your butts… basically you buy stuff by the POUND.

fucking seriously

However, despite being pretty intimate with the concept and expectations, I wasn’t prepared for how fucking HUGE the place was.

Now, you don’t go into a place like this without a strategy. I have a few personal surefire things I look for that make money. No I won’t tell you what they are, but you could probably guess. Certain small vintage electronics, stuff that college kids need that is overpriced as fuck in the campus bookstore, things like that. This time I figured I’d give a shot at acquiring unopened/unused printer cartridges since printer ink is the most valuable liquid on the planet and I wanna get a cut of that. While there I also took the time to take pics of certain things too…

sad, abandoned artwork

hilariously obsolete electronics

 and of course a full size mannequin because wtf

I also managed to find a ton of cute clothes (but no dressing room so no pics, sorry) as well as a few particularly interesting things of note:

A nearly complete 1977 Captain America board game

A copy of Animation Magazine with Beetlejuice-era Tim Burton on the cover

a pile of painstakingly preserved letters/postcards from 100 yrs ago I may serialize

and a Totoro backpack because Totoro backpack

It was a good haul overall, and I figure heading out here will be a regular thing for me. It’s just a little much to take in at once.

Maybe I was just out of practice.

Tags: antiques, blue hangar, blue hanger, goodwill, goodwill bins, thrift shoping, thrift store, thrift store misadventures