Starting a --secondhand--(!) pre-loved baby clothes (and all the other stuff!) shop...advice/thoughts please!

[beaufranked]

Hello everyone, I am thinking of buying a local business that sells 'pre-loved' stuff for kids and babies. I haven't seen all the figures etc yet so not sure if it's a runner but interested in what everyone would have to say on a few things:

What you wish you had bought second-hand?
What are your most sought after goods?
What makes for a nice shopping experience in a small local shop?
Do you have any shops in your area like this and what's good/bad about them?
Any other thoughts/feelings bout pre-loved stuff!

Would so appreciate it, thank you! Looking for a change in direction and would love to do this but need to know what I am getting into!

I buy and sell a fair amount of pre loved things and think it is a great idea.

There is a fab shop near us. Sells designer second hand children's clothes and is pretty successful. Prices are high but so is the quality. With cheaper clothes, there is alot of work involved in selling for little profit and the competition with cheap supermarket clothes, eBay etc is high.

For equipment and other things I usually buy and sell at NCT sales and / or eBay. I think there is a much bigger market available to sellers on eBay and the comission required to keep a second hand business running could put people off.

There could also be a market for decent second hand toys.

You might want to post this in the self employed section to get more opinions.

We also have a great second hand kids clothes/toys/pushchairs shop near us. Always rammed so can be hard to find stuff, but always good quality (sold some stuff and she only took the v best!), clean and ironed. Toys always a good unplanned purchase, pushchairs seem v hard to sell at good price to buyer and profit to you - we always ended up going through free-ads for that sort of thing.

Always take small children in with me, so a v small area where children can play with toys might have helped me browse a bit longer?

I'd be not so inclined to buy stuff that needs to be sterilised (you don't know where it's been) and it didn't sell big stuff (cots eg) though wondered if it could have acted as an 'agency' - advertising that people had stuff to sell, and taking an advertising fee?

Thanks guys for the thoughts and advice. Will post on self employed too. I think what's clear is being really clear on what I'm going to do and having online element too.

thanks ladies : )