December 5th, 2008

Thrift stores drowning in Christmas impulse gifts from yesteryear

Raymond Chen
Raymond Chen

Last year, the Washington Post covered the fates of The Thing, that Christmas impulse gift that stores place in enticing locations in the store to convince you that you simply gotta have it. The twirling apple peeler, the liquor carousel, the portable chocolate fountain (for your fancy party, no doubt).

After a few years, some of them show up by the garbage-bagful at the Opportunity Shop thrift store. “We get three or four fondue sets a month… Sometimes we get stuff and I don’t even know what the stuff is.”

Category
Old New Thing
Topics
Non-Computer

Author

Raymond Chen

Raymond has been involved in the evolution of Windows for more than 30 years. In 2003, he began a Web site known as The Old New Thing which has grown in popularity far beyond his wildest imagination, a development which still gives him the heebie-jeebies. The Web site spawned a book, coincidentally also titled The Old New Thing (Addison Wesley 2007). He occasionally appears on the Windows Dev Docs Twitter account to tell stories which convey no useful information.

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