Toowoomba’s Endless Edit: Sisters reveal how second-hand clothing market grew into massive monthly event
Sick of trying to sell clothes on Facebook Marketplace? Ellen Parkinson was, and it’s helped spark a monthly market sensation in Toowoomba. Check out all the pics here:
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Ellen Parkinson knew there had to be a better way to get rid of her family’s old clothes rather than just sending them to landfill or trying to sell them online.
“Pretty much I had a cupboard full of clothes and I’d just had kids and my styles had changed and sizing changed, and then found that I wasn’t alone in having all these clothes that I didn’t really know what to do with,” the Toowoomba woman said.
This idea is what gave birth to Toowoomba’s Endless Edit, a monthly preloved clothing market which Ms Parkinson runs with sisters Kate and Margaret.
After launching it with about a dozen stallholders in May last year, the event has grown to draw hundreds of customers and attendees every month.
“Just (this weekend) we had our second largest, which was 29 stallholders, so we’re now at the Indoor Toowoomba Bowls Hall (on Annand Street) and we’re getting over a couple of hundred people through the door,” Ms Parkinson said.
“It’s just grown as we’ve continued in terms of awareness and people buying and selling stuff — we get a few repeat people, but then we get lots of new people that come through.”
Ms Parkinson said what she didn’t expect to develop was a strong community around the markets and the ethos of sustainable clothing.
“People come and try it on, they can see it, they can deal with the customer and it creates a bigger community than what I even thought about at the start,” she said.
“It is really nice and it’s safe, and people make friends.
“People keep coming back and they tell us all their nice stories about the clothes that they found or what (event) they’ve worn the next thing for.
“So it’s just been so much more to it than just buying and selling clothes.”
Toowoomba’s Endless Edit will be back in August and run every month until November.
For details, head to the website at toowoombasendlessedit.com.au.
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