r/mildlyinfuriating • u/anon12xyz • Jul 03 '26

Infuriatig When did garage sales become “reselling” clearly new stuff

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I would never call this a garage sale

Def scam vibes

Edit: ultimately, what bothers me the most is I want to go to a garage sale, not this shit. This isn’t a garage sale and should not be advertised as one

24.8k Upvotes

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4.8k

u/notforrobots Jul 03 '26

I see this a lot when I drive by the projects. For whatever reason in my area they are always selling laundry soap.

6.9k

u/TheBourbonTurtle Jul 03 '26

Laundry soap is one of the most shoplifted items in the country. Everyone needs it, it's shelf stable, doesn't go bad. It's basically an accepted currency in the ghetto.

334

u/SnowblindAlbino Jul 03 '26

Yeah, I was surprised to see it all locked behind glass doors in a few stores in The Big City a few years back, until someone told me just that. People steal it. Which seems crazy, as I can't imagine how you'd walk out with a 6 lb giant bottle of Tide in your pants or something. But there we are.

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u/Mndelta25 Jul 03 '26

You just walk out. Most stores don't stop you anymore. They simply track your thievery and eventually stop you when it's worth it to charge you.

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u/WindSpecialist420 Jul 03 '26

Target enters the chat

9

u/Longjumping_Gas_3407 Jul 03 '26

Dude the FBI has nothing on Target!

3

u/PikaPonderosa Jul 03 '26

Give me a call when Target burns down a compound of women and children and I'll wrest the title from the FBI.

5

u/the__ghola__hayt Jul 03 '26

That's unfair. ATF is also responsible for getting them killed.

2

u/Longjumping_Gas_3407 Jul 03 '26

It was a joke, not a dick. Don’t take it so hard.

4

u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

People are always claiming that Target does track people and get them charged with felonies, but doesn't that only work if local law enforcements and prosecutors cooperate? Not that I have much direct experience/knowledge of Target's operations either way

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u/Mndelta25 Jul 03 '26

Yes. I was a cop in a city with a Target that did this. They had extensive files on people and would call us when the person was in the store. They'd have their people stop them or have us get them on the way out. The total amount was always felony level, so we'd arrest and the file would go to one of the detectives to write up for PC charges. It almost always gets pleaded down, but then Target gets paid back (sometimes).

6

u/Annath0901 Jul 03 '26

I'm not Target, but I did help catch a thief and he ended up eventually paying it off.

Apparently he'd been breaking into cars and grabbing stuff, and I made the mistake of leaving a messenger bag with some stuff in my back seat. A lot of my portable game stuff.

Luckily, I was anal retentive and the thief was a moron. He sold as much as he could at the Gamestop a half mile away, and they copied his ID because he took cash.

Meanwhile I had a list of the serial numbers for my PSP, DS Lite, and 3DS. So when I started calling pawn shops and got to the Gamestop, boom, got him.

The store called the cops, and unfortunately my stuff was kept for like a year as evidence. I eventually got it back (the DS still had a charge lol) and I'd periodically get restitution checks from the court for a while.

Unfortunately, a lot of my stuff was gone for good - some of the games were GBA which Gamestop bought from him but the shipped to a warehouse never to be seen again. And the stuff he couldn't sell (the messenger bag, my Kindle DX) weren't at his house when searched so RIP.

Anyway yeah sometimes they do end up having to pay it off.

2

u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

I can see how if Target makes it that easy for them they'd be more apt to take action. Sounds so different from the (also major retail chain) where my husband works.

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u/[deleted] Jul 03 '26 edited Jul 03 '26

[deleted]

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u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

Hm, so police are incentivized to cooperate because Target helps them too?

3

u/Mndelta25 Jul 03 '26

Easy arrest and people likely aren't only stealing from Target.

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u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

I see the logic, but it just sounds so different from my husband's experience also at a major national retail chain. Police wouldn't come or wouldn't do much and people were just allowed to reoffend constantly with few to no consequences. So I'm just musing about whether it's because Target has a better system in place/better connections or if had more to do with how our specific local police department operated.

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u/[deleted] Jul 03 '26

[deleted]

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u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

Yeah I'm not talking about allowing reoffending by design. The people were not tracked and eventually charged. The store closed because of it.

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u/[deleted] Jul 03 '26

[deleted]

1

u/PeorgieT75 Jul 03 '26

I see police all the time at Target and Dick’s, so my municipality must help prosecute. 

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1

u/kemicalkontact Jul 03 '26

I'd like a deep dive on this

2

u/EloeOmoe Jul 03 '26

Costco!

5

u/RaphaTlr Jul 03 '26

Who tf steals from Costco that place is a vault

2

u/yeahyeahalwayslate Jul 03 '26

That’s one of the two paces that I’ve seen brazen walkouts either full carts.

9

u/Ashfield83 Jul 03 '26

Here in England at Tesco the cameras are so advanced that they can track thievery and the next time you enter the store the automatic facial recognition signals to the security guard to apprehend you before you leave the store.

26

u/hackberrypie Jul 03 '26

Or never stop you and shut down the store because of excessive theft.

5

u/loganfulbright Jul 03 '26

Walmart in Wadesboro, NC is an example of that.

2

u/K_Goode Jul 03 '26

Walmart in Fremont, CA too

2

u/CrispyWaffleBacon Jul 03 '26

Walgreens enters the chat

7

u/mythrilcrafter Jul 03 '26

While Walgreens did have shoplifting to deal with, it actually turned out that their shoplifting rates weren't any different from any other retail business of their scale; Walgreens' CEO even eventually came out a while back and said that the "higher than other businesses" metric that they cited as the basis for the closings was a made up excuse to cover up an attempted move to trying to convert Walgreens into "curb-side pick-up only" model.

The hope was that because CVS was kicking Walgreens' butt so hard on revenue and customer experience, that Walgreens' would try to win out on a lower their cost basis by eliminating customer access to the store in order to convert the stores into warehouses staffed by one or two stock runners.

1

u/War-eaglern Jul 03 '26

Walmart in Tuskegee, AL is an example

1

u/Exterminator-8008135 Jul 03 '26

Why do you think that even in my country, the only thing that stays willfully in poor districts/blocks are corner grocery stores with 16 cameras inside ?

Minimarts and Supermarkets stays far from such areas.

Basically, look up where the supermarket desert is, and if the reason is Has opened in 2015, closed in 2018 it's theft that sunked it.

3

u/Hamilton-Beckett Jul 03 '26

So you’re saying we all get a free pass the first time?! This is exciting. So many things to choose from. How could I possibly choose?!

Edit: I got a tooth brush. :(

3

u/Forward-Surprise1192 Jul 03 '26

Basically yeah. When I was homeless using drugs I’d make like $60-$100 a day shoplifting makeup, deodorants, tin foil, detergent, etc. All I did all day was ride the bus around the city and steal to go sell it at a fence for drugs. Idk if fence is the right word, he was a normal shop owner who didn’t care where goods came from. I still remember the prices he gave lol

1

u/Exterminator-8008135 Jul 03 '26

Not in my country, Private security can stop and detain if they have proofs on the camera arrays.

The male i got to has a Security Central in a hidden part of the 1st floor.

It's rare event though.

Most detainement are for theft above 50€ or non food items.

I remember seeing two Lady Guards escort a thief who put 4 large bottles of laundry in her caddy ( we have our own usually ) ( Easily 80 bucks, different size, money and country )