New industry in town: Pallet selling, liquidation on the rise in North Central West Virginia - WV News

CLARKSBURG, W.Va. (WV News) — Pallet selling and liquidation, a popular business practice in surrounding states, is gaining popularity in the Mountain State, with a handful of businesses operating in North Central West Virginia.

Haddix Liquidations, located in Nutter Fort, has been operating for the past eight months and has seen plenty of success, according to owner Samantha Haddix.

Before she and husband Jason Haddix officially began their business, Samantha said she started out buying pallets, breaking them down and auctioning off items in her living room.

"I'd do like a live Facebook auction, so we did that for a while, and we were pretty successful with it. I realized I made money. It started strictly as a hobby. I'm a nurse, and I wasn't looking to do anything different. And my husband works full time. We were driving to Ohio to buy the pallets. That's when we realized there was nothing like that in the area, so as far as people selling pallets, that's new to this area, but that's not necessarily a new thing ... That's when we decided, 'Hey,w let's open something like that here.' That's kind of how it started," she said.

The pallets come from many different places, including big box stores like Walmart, Kohl's, Home Depot, Lowe's and Amazon.

"You're going to get new items that are overstocked items, discontinued items, going to get customer returns and anything like that you can expect to find on a pallet," she said.

Prices are based off of a percentage of retail, though sometimes it may be hard to price because what's on the pallet can be difficult to identify. None of the pallets, she said, are tampered with.

"They come directly off the truck, and we sell them as is. With that being said, we just try to price based off of what we paid for them and retail. That's just to give people room to make money," she said.

Business, she said, has been good with many people being responsive and returning to purchase more. Because they don't have regular business hours, she said she updates the business's Facebook frequently when new products arrive. Also, individuals can call and inquire.

"We have customers that own bin stores, there's customers that sell on eBay, we had flea market customers over the summer. We definitely have a repeat customer base," she said.

COVID-19 has been both good and bad from a business standpoint, she said.

"The bad part is distribution centers are working less so the loads may not come up as quickly as we'd like them to, freight cost has gone up, things like that. As far as customers, it's been great. For one, it gives someone an opportunity to make extra money, and another it's easier for them to do so because people like to shop from home instead of going out to the store. If you buy a pallet with all kinds of stuff on it, you're going to take it home, post online and people will love that because they don't have to go anywhere. COVID-19 has been very good on that aspect of helping people," she said.

Cletus Davis, who had been operating a business of his own in Glen Elk but is preparing to open a new business near Weston called Pinnacle Retail Liquidator, said he sees continued growth as far as customer base is concerned.

"I hope it continues to grow as far as customer base goes ... I think a lot of people are going to try it, and that's a good thing. If you're an actual liquidator like myself there's lots of people that buy from us and sell a lot of stuff on Facebook. It's a lot of extra income for them," he said.

"If you're treating your customers right, they are going to keep coming back because they're making extra money they are needing right now. That's what I think has caused it to grow a lot, too, because people are looking for that extra income where the coronavirus has either hurt their job or slowed them down," he said.

Individuals can come out, buy a pallet and have potential to double their money or more in some cases, he said.

"I think it will continue to grow as long as the prices stay fair," he said.

Being honest with the customers is also part of the equation of success, he said.

Davis said when he first became aware of pallets, he was investing in storage units and trying to keep items in his store in Clarksburg.

When the storage units couldn't keep up, he said he started looking into liquidation.

"That's how I found companies that were selling pallets and products from different big box stores and retailers. Then I started buying pallets from them one at a time ... Then I started selling the pallets myself," he said.

Davis said he's enjoyed the work.

"It is a successful business if ran properly … I guess the most important thing is to be honest. If you're honest and you don't try to kill your customers with cost ... As long as you keep your prices low, and we have a lot of products, that's how you make money. If you set on stuff and keep prices too high, you aren't going to make any money," he said.

Just like Samantha Haddix, Davis said he deals with different types of items from big box retailers, not tampering with anything on the pallet and pricing according to what it may contain.

His new business near Weston is expected to open in several weeks.