I like Starbucks coffee. But I love Starbucks mugs. In fact, I love any of the Starbucks items. When I spot a Starbucks item at a yard sale or in a thrift store, I grab it as quickly as possible. Over the past few weeks, I have sold the following from the Seattle-based coffee giant:
- A coffee canister
- A Starbucks logo coffee cup
- 3 espresso cups
- A baby chick coffee cup
- A West Palm Beach, Florida mug
- A Seattle, Washington mug
- A Miami, Florida mug
Each of the items brought at least a ten-fold profit over what I paid for the item. The best of all was for the Miami, Florida mug which is pictured above.
One day we were strolling through one of our favorite thrift stores, and I spotted two oversized mugs on the back of a bottom shelf. As I reached for the mugs, I saw that they were from Starbucks. I inspected both of them and they were in excellent shape.
I looked to see if the mugs had special price stickers. They did not. That meant that they were priced like all of the other generic mugs at $0.49. Even better, I have a frequent guest card from the thrift store which entitles me to 20% off. So my final price was $0.39 per mug.
The Miami mug is dated on the bottom from the year 1998. On one side is the image of a plane flying over Miami Beach. The other side features some art deco artwork with the wording, “Miami Beach – Art Deco Hotels – Bal Harbor”.
Last week I had the mug up for auction on eBay. On my iPhone, I have an eBay app which makes a nice noise whenever somebody bids on one of my items. As I was driving along Military Trail between West Palm Beach and Boynton Beach the other day, my phone started going crazy. Two people got into a bidding battle and the price kept climbing.
The mug sold the other day as you can see from this link on eBay. The final price was
$20.50
Shipping Destination: Minneapolis, Minnesota
Not too shabby for a $0.39 investment. That is 52.5 times my purchase price. As you can imagine, I have my eyes peeled for other Starbucks mugs.
