MISSOULA — Before moving away from Missoula, Lyndsey Holloway and her husband wanted to clean out their garage. The event they end up putting on went well beyond the average yard sale.
“It’s a multi-home estate/garage sale, and 10% of our proceeds are going to go to the food bank. We're also accepting food donations,” Holloway said.
The sale took over Free Cycles on Sunday. People flocked to the event, shopping for everything from snowboards to books to clothes on tables mixed in among the bike shop’s tires and wrenches.
“Literally like 11:05, we had advertised 11 to four, and there were like 50 people in here right at 11,” Holloway said. “It was a big rush right at the beginning.”
The event all started with a social media post on Missoula's Reddit page.
“We're moving from Montana in January, and we wanted somewhere inside to do a garage sale and sell our stuff. But, you know, it's not really worth renting out Free Cycles for just us,” Holloway said. “The first place I went was I posted it, like the idea, on Reddit. I was like, ‘Would anybody want to get together and do a winter garage sale with me?’”
People did and, in the end, the sale featured booths from six sellers around Missoula. Sellers said it offered customers the chance to shop with their planet and community in mind, while they got to pass on unwanted stuff.
“I’m excited to see what secondhand goods are available. That also fits the free Cycles motto,” said Free Cycles Director Bob Giordano.
This is exactly the kind of event Free Cycle’s loves to host.
“A couple of people in the neighborhood reached out about having this estate sale and they said part of the proceeds go to the food bank,” Giordano said. “Free Cycles is here to help the community, be a part of the community. So of course, we just said, ‘sure.’”
He hopes more people reach out to host events.
“Free Cycles is more than a community bike shop,” he said. “We're blessed with plenty of space, and we want to provide it back out to the community.”
Like Giordano, Holloway was excited about the turn out. The sale did much more than help her get ready for her big move.
“Thanks to the community for coming out,” she said. “We really love living in Montana for this exact reason, or Missoula for this exact reason: is that people come together really easily.”
