Tuesday 13 March 2018

Penang: Salvation Army Family Thrift Store @ Jalan Perak

The classic thrift store experience of being able to buy clothes, mugs, and hula-hoops in one place, can be experienced at this thrift store. 


An online search shows that Salvation Army has thrift stores all over the world and one in Penang, Malaysia. Here, the store is known as Kedai Jimat Family Thrift Store. 

Its a two-unit lot in a commercial area with one unit as the main store and the other as the store's storage space. When I first walked into the store, I was amazed by the variety of things up for sale. 

It's easy to navigate around the store as there are four main sections - ladies wear, men's wear, toys, and books. Everything else that does not fall into these four categories is placed wherever there is space in the store. 


Whenever I visit the place, the first section that I will check out is the ladies wear. Half of the store is filled up with women's clothing ranging from dresses, tops, singlets, swimwear, jeans, skirts and sometimes even bra! 

Then I will move to the bag section which is basically a large red container with a pile of bags. There had been times when I found gems like an Aldo wristlet. It was in perfect condition! 


There are times when I visit this store and buy nothing at all because I don't see anything that I like or need. I'm just curious to see the items donated by people for that day and to find out how much the store will sell it.


No matter what people donate to this store, they will find a space or way to display and sell it. The store has an entire shelf dedicated to mugs and plastic containers. There are times when the shelf is completely empty. 

I asked the storekeeper about it and he said that sometimes people would come in and buy the whole lot. Mugs are slow selling items but they definitely sell, eventually.

Don't even get me started on the books! If you're a National Geographic magazine collector, do check out their collection.  


The shoe section is quite interesting as the style and sizes are quite random. I bought a pair of sneakers here and its brand new and the shoe's outsole was clean. It was a great deal to own a pair of Cotton On sneakers from their Rubi Collection. 



Additional Details: 
Price Range: $*
Operation Hours: 8.15am to 5.45pm (closed on Sunday)
Address: 56D/56E Perak Plaza, Jalan Perak, 10150, Penang Malaysia 
Contact No: 04-2279369

*$ - cheap, $$ - reasonable, $$$- luxury