Charity Shopping in Sligo

If you are thinking of making the trip to Sligo to visit the charity shops, have a look at how we got on there this week.

First Shop; Custom Quay

We started out with the North West Hospice Shop, located on the Custom Quay. This shop has the best parking access of all that we visited in Sligo; if you are lucky enough to get a spot, there is a car park right outside the door of the shop. Unfortunately, parking was an issue for us as you are limited to two hours in any one car park in the town centre. This, combined with a one way system they call the City Loop, made things a little difficult.

The North West Hospice shop is very large, with everything from clothes to furniture, books, toys and homeware. If you are trying to browse the whole shop for bargains, allow plenty of time. We managed to get the pushchair round without too much difficulty but it was a squeeze in places.

Prices varied greatly; the first thing I spotted was a Reiss top with tags still attached that was being sold for 40 Euro. A great bargain if you want a designer top for yourself, but not great for a reseller. We still managed to pick up two or three items from the sale rail. Staff were lovely and friendly.

Second and Third Shops; Wine Street

The next two shops were side by side in the Wine Street Car Park. Again, if you can get a space here, you are limited to a two hour stay.

Enable Ireland is quite small inside but they had plenty of clothing.

This shop feels very fresh and modern inside and there was plenty of pushchair space. We picked up a Reiss top for 6 Euro that we hope will reach about £20 on eBay.

Next to Enable Ireland was Essential Seconds.

Essential Seconds was large inside. There was clothing, books, some toys and some homeware. We typically find that the men’s section is much smaller than the women’s, so it is always great when we find plenty of men’s clothing to look through. It was easy to push the pushchair round this shop, which always helps when there is browsing to be done. We found a pair of Desigual shoes for 6 Euro that we have yet to decide on a price for, but we are hoping they will make us a little bit of a profit.

After Wine Street, it was time to move the car again. The four remaining shops were very close together but it was tricky to find a spot this time.

Fourth Shop; Grattan Street

Oxfam Sligo is on Grattan Street.

Oxfam is Oxfam; we have been to many of their shops and they are all very similar inside. There was plenty to look through, but towards the back of the shop the pushchair was a bit wide for the narrow spaces. If we didn’t have such a grabby baby, it might not have been a problem, but we got wedged a few times when a little hand managed to get a hold of a hanging trouser leg or sleeve and refuse to let go.

Although the clothing was beautiful, the prices were too high for us. We found a Cos dress for 15 Euro that might have sold on eBay, but after all fees and postage, it would have had to work very hard to make a profit for us.

And Finally; Harmony Hill

After Oxfam, we made our way to Harmony Hill, which has three charity shops in a row.

First was the Thrift Shop.

The Thrift Shop is small inside but has so much to look at. Because it was small, I was able to park the pushchair and browse while keeping baby in sight, which worked for us better than trying to squeeze around all of the rails. The lady working here was super helpful too and didn’t mind toddler hands browsing the kids’ books.

We found a Hobbs dress here for 9 Euro that should make us a little profit on eBay.

This shop doesn’t take card payments so make sure to have cash with you if you are shopping here.

Next to the Thrift Shop was Vincent’s, listed on Google as Ozanam SVP.

If we had come here first, the parking would not have been such an issue; the very friendly staff member noticed we weren’t local and came outside to give directions to a nearby carpark without the two hour limit. We will bear that in mind for next time.

This shop was very large inside, and were having a sale on kids’ clothing where everything was one Euro.

We found a very nice Boden jacket for six Euro that I only wished I could fit into. Sometimes it is hard to let beautiful things go!

Our last shop of the day was to be NCBI, just a few doors up on Harmony Hill.

Unfortunately, we were out of luck. There was some maintenance work going on inside and the shop was closed. However, we will return another day, and who knows what we might find waiting for us in there?

Conclusion

Did we have a good day in Sligo? We had a mostly good day. The town itself is lovely, the people we met were all lovely, and the shops (except for the one that was closed!) were all great for browsing. We did find that the prices had increased from the last time we visited about a year ago. This has been pretty universal, though. We were still able to find some good purchases and left happy. On our next visit, we will be better prepared for the parking and the one way system.

We have added the shops we visited to our Charity Shop Map here.

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