Uh-Oh.... Competition!

A special note for reader Keah: Keah, I sent you an email. If you didn't get it, can you resend your email? I went by memory and may have gotten it wrong! :)

I have a particular Swiss friend who has caught the Thrifting Bug from me. It has warmed my heart to shop with her, and to hear of a great success at the Heils-Armee's Winter Kleider Markt in Luzern, where she snagged some mint-condition boots for 36 CHF that turned out to be retailing for 200 Euros (so she paid 85% less, and the Heils-Armee got a donation of 36! Everyone wins!).

She also found an identical replacement for a sentimental item her parents had had for 30-some-odd years that had recently kicked the bucket. Turned out that her mom was considering buying the same item on eBay for 80 Euros, while my friend found one at Brockiland and took it home for just 5 CHF. (That's a savings of 95%... Ninety-five!!!). It was a thrifting-miracle!

I started this blog for two main reasons:

1. I couldn't find a good and consistent English-language information source (or indeed any recent and relevant info source at all) re: the thrifting scene here in Zürich, and
2. I wanted to promote thrifting here, because I can't get over just how fruitful the pickings are! And it seemed as if none of the (young) locals appreciated it, which I found tragic.

There was a third reason, and that was online-bragging of my purchased goodies. :) I must admit that this was probably the bigger motivating factor! :D

I saw this article in Blick am Abend on the 15th:

I want that cheetah poster!!! And, take it from me, it's a TERRIBLE idea to decorate your floors with tennis balls (for many reasons, esthetics coming a distant 2nd!).

Maybe it's vanity, but I rather wonder if the author looked at my blog and put Brockiland Fahrweid at the top of the list for furniture. :) Then again, they missed out on Arche Brockenhaus, my other big recommendation for cheap furnishings. Possibly they just went to the Brockiland website and saw their advertisement about the Fahrweid location having the bigger selection of home-furnishings. This is more likely, I suppose. ;)

I have NOT been to the Emmaus in Dübendorf, yet. Hmmm... maybe my next review?! :)

Regardless, I do wonder if 'thrifting' has started to become socially acceptable with the younger Swiss crowd. They seem to have caught the Hipster-disease fairly badly (a wide-spread phenomenon, which I find hilarious since I'm pretty sure the Hipster scene started in my home city of Vancouver... or possibly Portland, but there's a lot of cross-traffic between the two cities so it would be hard to tell!). :)

But how the Hipster-itis did not lead to the common secondary symptom of thrifting, I could never figure out. A too-affluent city, maybe? I do notice that 'brand names' are much more important to the Swiss (perhaps Europeans in general) than they are to the average Canadian. It even says as much in the article, advising people to not focus on brands but rather the item itself.... does that even need to be said?! Are people such slaves to labels that they can't judge a product by its own merits?! :S

Typical of Switzerland, if you want to buy into this el-cheapo 'fad' of thrifting, you can buy a book on the subject for 27.90 CHF.

I'd like to point out that my last TWO binges at Brockiland totalled 28 CHF. (13 + 15 Fr.).

So for the price of two 'loads' from a Brocki, you could buy a brand new book on the subject. ;) Isn't that a little ironic and rather against the whole point of thrifting?! :D

Anyway, I don't know if 'competition' will suddenly increase (I'll bet it will, but whether or not it has an appreciable effect will be hard to say). Frau Gerold's Garten on Geroldstrasse (Hardbrücke) is over-flowing with Hipsters, and is now utterly surrounded by vintage furniture stores (Walter, Bogen 33, etc.). 

The thing about "Hipsters", as far as I can see, is that they are mostly composed of the sort of insecure people who are desperately trying to fit-in, and to do this they all conform to a wide-spread trend that they (stupidly) see as non-conformist. Ah, the irony.

But the thing about this mentality is that it means that these sorts of individuals, desperate for the esteem of other individuals they see as 'cool', will slavishly follow the 'coolest' course. Which probably (hopefully) means preferential shopping at the Hipster vintage stores with the flashy price tags, where they can be seen by other posers and score Hipster points with them. :) (Is that too judgmental on my part?! Apologies if so. I have a strong repulsion to try-hard-itis in many forms. Too many fake people in my life, I guess). ;)

So I feel reasonably reassured that the thrifting scene here in Zürich might get a healthy injection of interest and cash-flow, while still remaining a true-thrifter's paradise. Still, more competition in your general demographic can be a negative, so GO OFTEN and GO EARLY to counter-act any potential negative effects. :)

Wishing you the best thrifting luck, friends!

TiZ