I don’t know about this-where I am, the Goodwill store has stuff that is really beat up, used up. I have never seen oriental carpets, in any condition. And the furniture they have looks like its been through a war-scratched, chipped, dented, etc.
About the only things I ever buy there are old table lamps (which I break down for parts), and the occasional music CD. The clothing looks like it has been WELL used.
I’ve found that some thrift shops are fairly picky about what they take in, while others will accept damn near everything. The pickier ones are better to shop at. Also, even in the same chain, it seems that different stores will have different people who habitually drop stuff off. So, they’ll have different suppliers, so to speak. I don’t even bother with some stores, unless I have a lot of time to kill. Other stores seem to have someone with almost exactly my tastes, but a far bigger budget, and she LIKES to redecorate.
Inexpensive area rugs (oriental or otherwise) are in pretty high demand in the US, dorm rooms usually need one to cover the cold tile floors. I can’t imagine finding one at a Goodwill. Not that I’ve ever looked into obtaining an oriental rug, but it seems like *any *functional area rug would become a hand-me-down to friends or relatives (or eventually consigned, unusable, to the dumpster) before making its way to a resale shop.
Here is the rug I put up on E-bay. I have had a potential buyer already ask me for more, so I went to Goodwill and took pictures. I’ll see how it goes and if I really get a rewarding hobby out of this.
There must be more durable stuff that goes through these kinds of antique fashion cycles. Well-made antique furniture does not degrade much over decades, it just goes in and out of fashion. If one knows what they are doing and have storage, you can pick up stuff when (or where) it is out of fashion and sell it when (or where) it fetches a higher price.
Yesterday I walked by a store I didn’t know, and which had the most gorgeous antiques. A shell-inlay box, an oak-and-brass travel chest very similar to the one I inherited from my great-grandfather, a couple of grandfather’s clocks, a toy train still in its perfectly-kept box…
It’s a Remar, an association dedicated to helping drug addicts kick the habit and get jobs. If I ever get to have a house to decorate here in Barcelona, they’re absolutely going to be one of my first stops; based on what I’ve seen in some of their other locations, their prices are 1/10 to 1/50 the price you’d get from an antiques shop or buying new, at least for anything more expensive than single dishes.
If you got the proper carpet you could fly it the the USA.
It’s gorgeous! I hope it sells okay and you don’t end up out of pocket 
One thing to note is the area around Maastricht has aging population (vergrijzing) young people are relocating to the bigger cities in the north and a lot of older people are moving into retirement homes…
Maybe that could explain the surplus of carpets?
My effin’ brother donated the oriental rug he got from our mother to the Goodwill. Didn’t even effin’ occur to him to ask if I might want it. Grrr.
I love them, but so do those icky little wool-eating carpet beetle larvae. Nowadays they make synthetic Oriental rugs which look exactly like wool (if you don’t get down on your belly with a magnifying glass) but are easier to clean and they don’t attract bugs. I have one in my living room.
The Ebay listing says the rug belonged to an aunt. I thought it came from goodwill.
Yeah, I [del]lied[/del] embellished about that. I thought people would find an heirloom more chic then a goodwill find. Even if it DID belong to an aunt, just not mine. Besides, hey, Amsterdam, conversation-piece-worthy. No-one knows Maastricht. Even though judging by American distances, Maastricht is pretty much a suburb of Amsterdam (or, rather, the other way around. We’re older then Amsterdam).
A friend of mine bought a bunch of them from her local second-hand shop: and nailed them to the rafters as cheap attic insulation. She brought me and another friend up to show us her crafty solution. 'Nother friend had a full-on conniption fit. It seems she knows about carpets, and two of these were mid-five figure worthy - before they had nails driven through them.
I inherited a rather large wool oriental rug from my grandparents a couple years back. After I got tired of the cats barfing on it all the time, I rolled it up and stashed it under the sofa. I have plans (but not time) to hang it on the wall…
Looks like a beautiful rug, Maastricht! Your auntie Goodwill was very kind.
Not for nothing, but this is a bit like the person exclaiming that they’ve found a rare treasure for $ 5.00 because the small paper label inside of the violin reads " Antonio Stradivarious Kremona ".
( His name isn’t Stradivarius. It’s Stradivari ). And of course, it’s spelled Cremona.
Well, it’s been a month. I invested about 60 bucks in four more carpets. Then I found out that my whole business model was faulty; shipping costs are way too high. But that only holds for stiff carpets, because then the lenght of the package exeeds the standard and then shipping costs skyrocket.
I worked out a deal with the buyer of this Ebay carpet and sent him a thinner, larger carpet that I could fold and roll into a 3 ft package. I got 150 bucks for it, so I’m out even and have three more carpets I don’t know what to do with. 
In other news: most of the goodwill shops in my town have carpets for sale. Just one, in the south part of town, doesn’t. One block from that South Goodwill is an antique store that sells a lot of vintage oriental carpets. :dubious:
I went to look there and he asked 300 euros (400 USD) for a carpet. At least they were very well cleaned.
I buy them if they are cheap enough. I put them in my garage and park my cars on them. I have one on my drum riser. My shop looks like the stage at a Grateful Dead show. I have one I roll out behind my camper and set my folding chairs on. Keeps the stickers out of my feet at the lake.
Put one in my house? Not a chance. People are filthy and so are thier second-hand rugs. 
Reported.
Zombie carpets!