Is ThriftCon Worth It?

So I'm a big fan of vintage. The clothes, the toys, everything. I'll just go back to my childhood when I see original My Little Pony's or PeeWee Playhouse figures. 

My daughter loves vintage too. She comes up with incredible outfits with pieces she's found at thrift stores. 

For example, this dress and scarf were both found at Goodwill. I believe the entire look is under $10. 

This dress was given to her, and she paired it with accessories she found at a thrift store:

Natalie was the one who told me about ThriftCon, which is a convention that has a bunch of booths filled with vintage goodies. We decided we would check it out.

Now, the website did warn that products wouldn't be priced as they might be at a garage sale. So we were warned.

It cost $17 for tickets if you purchased early online.  ($20 if you waited.)

And it was pretty neat to see all the booths. There were racks and racks of clothes. 

But were they affordable clothes? Eh, not really. There were some t-shirts that were marked at $100. I was like, what, is this laced with GOLD? I get that it might be from the 90s, but damn. 

We did manage to find some t-shirts on clearance racks, and that's where we mostly looked. 

Natalie did love this dress, but it was $190. For a USED DRESS. I mean, did someone famous wear it? 

(Oh, and the outfit Natalie wore was thrifted.)

Anyhow, there were cassette tapes that weren't too expensive. We love Davie Bowie:

There were vinyls, and some were affordable, but others were pricey. 

I was looking forward to checking out the toys. There weren't as many as I had hoped, but I was thrilled to find Steve Urkel. I used to watch Family Matters on TGIF. 

I was on the search for the game DreamPhone. I used to love as growing up, and I'd love to own it again. But alas, no DreamPhone. ("I know who likes you, but I'm not telling, HA HA.")

Was it worth it? Well, tickets were $17, as I mentioned, and parking was $15. There were a lot of overly expensive items. I wish more booths had affordable options. I mean, hello, in THIS economy asking for a $100 t-shirt? 

I probably wouldn't return, but Natalie said she would. It seemed like she was the demographic targeted, because all the young ones would jump in and go through racks as though they were professionals. Meanwhile, us older folks started to get cranky when people constantly bumped into us and we'd be the ones shouting, "FIFTY DOLLARS FOR A USED SKIRT?" 

I did like stumbling upon these Girls Next Door bobbleheads. I used to watch the show and I even watched it again with Natalie. She became a huge fan of Holly, so she squealed when I showed her the dolls. I didn't even check the price. I am sure they were out of my price range judging but how everything else was marked. 

So maybe I would attend again, but with the knowledge that I wouldn't be purchasing many items.

ThriftCon is headed to Orlando next, so if you're in the area and have the extra funds, pop on in. (And let me know if you find any vintage Panic at the Disco t-shirts. That's what my daughter was after. Alas, we had no luck, but she did find a 2014 Fallout Boy shirt, so it wasn't a total loss.)