Marilyn Tullos moved to Delaware a few years ago, but whenever she comes back to town, she makes sure to visit Yesterday's Rose in Fairfax. "There's something here that brings me back," she said. "The idea is good where it's for charity. It serves the community, and it does a lot of good things for people who need it."
The nonprofit thrift store, known as "Rosies" by its regulars, has been open for 23 years. It is owned by a coalition of the American Red Cross, the Arc of Northern Virginia, the National Council of Jewish Women and Service Source Inc. “Our associations take care of the hearts and minds of a lot of different people,” said Judy Stone, the store manager.
The charities spilt the profits. "Everybody has to provide at least 135 hours of volunteers per month," said Dolly Shie, assistant manager of the store.
The store was opened 23 years ago when Stone, a member of the National Council of Jewish Women, had the idea for a charity thrift shop. Her group, however, didn’t have the resources to open it on their own. “I decided the best way to do this was to start a coalition,” Stone said.
Although some told her that the store would not succeed, she quickly proved them wrong. “Within six weeks, we were out of the red and into the black,” Stone said.
Each charity reaps about $60,000 per year from their participation in the store, Stone said. “The community has accepted us with open arms,” she said. “I’m convinced if this store was open 24 hours, we’d have people in here shopping at two in the morning.”
Volunteers at the store also come from people in the courts system who have to do community service hours, students in the high schools who have to complete service hours and some students from George Mason University. "On any given day, I don't know how many employees I'll have," Shie said.
When new volunteers show up at the door, they are given the 10-cent tour and put to work, Shie said. Most, however, do not stay beyond the number of hours that they are compelled to serve. "Most of them, by the time they know what they're doing, leave," Shie said.
Being able to just show up when they have time is one of the draws for some volunteers. "It has a lot of flexibility," said Jill Berthaiume, a George Mason student, who has been volunteering at the store for about a month.
Berthaiume and Berkeley Bennett, another George Mason student, were sorting through some of the donated clothes on a recent afternoon. "You see all sorts of clothes that remind you of when you grew up," Bennett said.
“No two days are the same, Stone said. “You never know what’s going to come through the door.”
Another way of keeping things fresh is the store’s variety of sales. Shie usually comes up with the ideas, Stone said. For the past few months, the store had an “alphabet sale” in which items that started with a certain letter of the alphabet were half off. For the letter ‘X’, Stone said, the Shie suggested “X-ray” everything that could be seen through was for sale. “She’s incredibly creative,” Stone said of Shie.
BESIDES CLOTHING, the store carries furniture, books, housewares, toys and small electronic equipment. It also does a "brisk trade" in vinyl records, Shie said.
Some items, however, don't make it out on the floor. "We sell some things on e-Bay, Shie said. Items like the hood ornament from a 1931 Pierce-Arrow auto would not likely have sold well at the store, she said. But on the Internet, the item was able to fetch $660.
Occasionally, the store receives antiques. Shie remembered a little vase that the shop had received, similar to one that had been on an appraisal show on television. They were able to sell the vase at auction for $4,500. "It was this little, ugly vase," Shie said.
Items priced that high are rare, however. Typically, the store tries to price items at about half of what they would cost new. However, no formula exists, and with the erratic staffing, prices on similar items can vary widely. "Everybody has their own opinion of what something's worth," Shie said.
Also, the store will not carry certain items, such as baby furniture, because of the constantly updated safety guidelines that make it difficult to know which items are legal to sell. Computers and live animals are also not accepted.
Still, regulars like Tullos are able to find bargains regularly. "The trick is to find it before somebody else," she said. "You may not see something at first, but if you look a little bit longer, you're going to find something."