Shopper calls out thrift store for price tag on half-used hygiene product: 'Just sad'

A thrift shopper stumbled across a store trying to pull a fast one on consumers by offering a half-used product for an unnecessarily high price.

In the r/ThriftGrift subreddit, the shopper shared a photo of a half-used bottle of Bath & Body Works Sugar Plum Swirl lotion being sold for $7.99 at their local Value Village.

"Half used lotion anyone? Found this insanely priced yuck at value village today," they wrote in the caption.

Redditors in the comments were beyond disappointed with the attempted sale. "This isn't even considered laughable. Just sad," one person wrote.

Another noted that at the actual Bath & Body Works store, "during the winter sales, this is like 6 bucks new!"

Some thrift and secondhand stores are embracing a corporate approach to pricing, frustrating customers. Some of the causes are the rising cost of operations, like rent and wages; the quality of items being donated to thrift stores; and the overall demand for thrift shopping increasing, according to a 2023 AOL article. 

What's your primary motivation in shopping at thrift stores? Cheaper clothes 🤑 Trendier items 😎 Reduced environmental impact 🌎 I don't thrift 🚫 Click your choice to see results and speak your mind.

But thrifting still has a lot of benefits that are worth the occasional dud of a find. Many people have stumbled across brand-name items worth hundreds and sometimes thousands more than what they're being sold for in the store. One person recently picked up an authentic vintage Tiffany & Co. silver bowl for just a dollar, while another scored a pair of Knoll chairs, which retail individually for upward of $3,500, for just $15 apiece. 

Shopping secondhand also has environmental benefits. According to Earth.org, textiles alone make up 101 million tons of landfill waste annually, and that number is likely to grow because of the prevalence of fast fashion. Opting to buy secondhand helps reduce resources being spent on new items, like jeans that can use about 1,800 gallons of water in the manufacturing process, according to the University of Colorado, Boulder.

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