Spring Cleaning Your Closet: A Thrifter’s Guide to Decluttering
Spring is right around the corner, and for many of us, that means it’s time to tackle the closet. According to the American Cleaning Institute, 80% of Americans participate in spring cleaning every year (source). For thrifters and resellers, spring cleaning is about more than just tidying up. It’s a fantastic opportunity to inventory what you own, turn clothing you’re no longer using into cash, and make room for better finds.
Did you know that 82% of the clothing in an average American’s closet wasn’t worn in the previous 12 months? (source) That’s a lot of untapped value taking up space and collecting dust. In this post, I’ll explore how to declutter your closet, how to sell what you no longer need, and how to fill in your wardrobe gaps with secondhand purchases.
Step 1: Pull Everything Out
The best way to start cleaning out your closet is to remove everything so you can see what you’re working with. That means all of the clothes, shoes, bags, belts, and anything else tucked into your drawers and on shelves needs to come out and be laid out in one place.
I know, for some of us (me included!), just laying everything out can take up every available surface of a room or two. It can feel overwhelming, but it’s important. You can’t make good decisions about what to keep and what you regularly use if half your wardrobe is hidden away. Once everything is visible, you’ll probably be surprised by how much you own and how much of it you’d forgotten about.
Step 2: Organize
As you go through each piece of clothing, sort items into four categories:
Keep. These are items that you wear regularly. If you know you’ve worn it in the last six months, it earns a spot in your closet.
Sell. Any items in good condition that you no longer wear are great candidates for resale. As you decide what to sell, consider brand recognition, condition, quality, and demand. The more of those boxes that you can check, the better the item is for resale.
Donate. For items that are in decent shape but don’t fit the criteria for brand, quality, and/or demand, consider donating them to local community organizations, thrift stores, or shelters. Items with minor flaws can also be included here.
Recycle or Discard. If an item is heavily stained, torn, or otherwise damaged, send it to a textile recycling program (not the garbage bin). Some thrift stores and retailers accept clothing for recycling regardless of condition.
Step 3: Sell
This is where spring cleaning and decluttering gets more exciting for the resale-minded. Once you have a nice pile of items to sell, it’s time to get them listed and sold. It’s really important that you don’t let your “sell” pile sit around for weeks; it just makes it more likely that the items will end up back in your closet. Set aside a day or two to start photographing and listing the items from your decluttering activities.
Selling is of course my area of expertise, so if you need tips beyond what’s on the blog, make sure to check out my Complete Guide to Clothing Resale.
Step 4: Refresh your Wardrobe
Now that you’ve cleared space and raised some money from clothing sales, resist the urge to fill your closet back up with impulse buys. Instead, take stock of what’s left in your closet and look for potential gaps. Maybe you need a versatile sweater, a good pair of summer sandals, or a lightweight jacket. Focus on what you need after the clearout.
Thrift stores see a big surge of high-quality donations during spring cleaning season. That means racks will soon be stocked with better-than-usual finds, so keep visiting and check out what people are donating. As you fill in your closet gaps, focus on quality over quantity, pieces that fit your lifestyle and that you’ll actually wear, and don’t just buy things because they’re cheap.
Step 5: Keep Out the Clutter
The biggest challenge after decluttering your closet is staying on top of it. Here are a few tips that can help:
- One In, One Out. Set up a rule for yourself that every time you bring something new home, you remove something you have. This keeps your closet from getting overcrowded.
- Seasonal check-ins. Instead of cleaning your closet out once a year, do a quick closet review at the start of each season. Keep it simple; just pull out things you didn’t wear during the last season and decide if they’re worth keeping.
- Rotate hangers. At the start of each season, turn all your hangers backward. When you wear something, hang it back the correct way. At the end of the season, you will easily see what you did and didn’t wear.
Conclusion
Spring cleaning your closet doesn’t have to be a painful chore. When you approach it with the right strategy and mindset (including seeing it as an opportunity to make some money and improve your wardrobe!), it can be a highly productive, fun task. So pull everything out, organize with purpose, sell what you can, donate what you can’t, and then hit the thrift stores with a plan.
Happy thrifting!
