From the blogworld: how to be a smashing success at thrifting

This article is a few years old, but it's still pretty good. Like at least one of the commenters, though, I disagree with the statement that "real" thrift shops don't sort clothes for rips etc.  When the girls and I volunteered at the MCC store for two years, that's exactly what the volunteers and staff did do. They didn't catch everything, and I've bought things myself that turned out to have non-obvious stains or whatever, but they did give everything at least a once-over.