Community Thrift

This place is two floors high, it’s by far the largest thrift store I’ve been to. There are lots of good deals to be found!

I’ve been here a handful of times and I go back and forth on whether it’s a 3-​star or 4-​star. Let’s call it a 3.5-star and round it up because it’s SO huge inside.
The first couple of times I tried to go here, I was unsuccessful, because it has limited/​weird hours, especially in winter. This time, in July, they had unadvertised extended hours, so they’re open on Friday and Saturday evenings until 7 pm. If you have your heart set on going, it’s worth calling ahead to ask.
It’s in a large two-​story barn of a building, but you can’t really see how big it is until you turn off the street and head down the drive into the large parking lot. Clothing, shoes, jewelry, and kitchenware is on the ground floor, while the upper floor has books, art, home appliances, and sporting goods. Women’s clothing and shoes tends more toward the polyester senior-​comfort stuff, not so much with the cool vintage.
They have an especially large selection of vintage glassware (many in sets) and suddenly a really good selection of books for cheap. Lots of good modern fiction and literature in paperback for $ 1.25!
Generally, prices are decent, but I haven’t really ever known them to have awesome sales — they don’t do colored tag discounts or anything like that. More often than not, I don’t buy anything when I go, but more because I just don’t find anything I like than because the prices are high. If you’re thrifting on Whidbey, though, this is probably the big one to hit.

Great thrift store on Whidbey. My mom found a Lego book I had just ordered off of amazon for my husbands birthday, and I got a like new corduroy jacket for my 8 month old. Nice selection here and very organized, ran by volunteers. The only thing my mom and I were disappointed with was that the cashier neglected to give my mom the 50% discount, and gave me the wrong discounts on the wrong tags, making everything a different price than expected. It was all realized after the fact when the debit had already been ran. She had such a flippant aloof attitude about it that I was scared to ask her to correct the mistakes for fear of making it worse. However, overall it wasn’t a huge deal.

This has to be the most organized thrift store in the Pacific Northwest. Even bottles of conditioner have their own labeled bins. The isles are clean un-​cluttered. Definitely not too shabby. There are goods to look at like unique antique items to sheet music for those budding music enthusiasts. The only downside is the prices an select items. Don’t expect stoerwide deals, but expect interesting finds.

Day two of our Whidbey Island vacation brought miserable weather that was really a disincentive to explore much of the island. But, we did make it out once and paid a visit to another area thrift shop, this one run by the Island Senior Services.
The Community Thrift Store is housed in a big and new-​ish building (at least compared to the building Good Cheer is in – see my review) we were really excited to enter this store and see what discoveries we might find. This store has everything you might expect: movies, books, clothing, housewares, sports equipment. It’s a larger space than Good Cheer, so it can house more, but we found the ambiance of the store really lacking. Now I know what you’re thinking. «Come on, it’s a thrift show. It’s not a Nordstrom», and yes, you are absolutely right. But what’s the fun of shopping in a barn? We wandered around, looking at ugly sweaters, obscure coffee mugs (anyone remember The Goodwill Games?) and random pieces of art. We didn’t find anything particularly noteworthy or unusual, which for us is the true joy of thrift shopping. After about 15 minutes we were ready to go.
Whereas I’m looking forward to heading back to Good Cheer and spending some additional time exploring the nooks and crannies of that space, I don’t feel any need to return to Community Thrift Store. Still, they serve a critical mission for the Whidbey community and I’m sure the area seniors are grateful for their support and grateful to the island residents who donate to it.

We love stopping by this place. We have gotten some cool items, and all for VERY cheap. We have noticed that some of the bigger items were a little pricey for a thrift store, but all the little items we have bought have been oh so cheap. And to top it off our first time there we put our name in their drawing and won $ 30 credit there. A very fun store that we will frequent.

I have visited this thrift store at least once a month for the last two years. I would have given the thrift a 5 star review up until the last 6 months or so. The prices have skyrocked! A cheap purse marked at $ 20. A frying pan at $ 35. A side table at $ 65! Those of us that mainly shop at thrift stores know that these prices are rediculous! I understand it helps seniors, but I cannot afford to shop there any longer. Its just too bad that a great thrift store has changed and needs to re-​classified as a discount store.

Five effing stars
Five effing stars because i have never gone to this place and not laughed regularly for the entire visit.
Five effing stars because my coffee mug collection has been COMPLETED by the artifacts that i find here, i am looking at YOU my little «Lord of the Dance» mug.
Five stars because the T shirts are always great, because i can leave my Wife at the post cards and know where to find her an hour later, because the book section is dripping with such unintentional irony — a window into what was relevant 40 years ago and what was never relevant: «erotic hauntings through the ages» (allllllllllll mine, .50cents!), five stars because where else can you find an entire shelves full of amazing examples of mass consumerism like: precious moment (s?) sculptures, dolphins dolphins, brass dolphins, crystal dolphins, rock dolphins, clay dolphins, more dolphins than there are in the fucking gulf of mexico, scores of raggedy ann/​dy dolls (terrifying…), things made from rebar, an army of angels, gods of the MOTHER EFFING GAPS YO!, you name it, this place has it. It is like every house from every person over 55 was turned upside down, and what fell out was collected, collated, and put up for sale.
I have seen things, things that have shot me straight back to the early 80s — my grandma’s house, a house that even in 83 was a 40 year old time capsule. Nothing valuable really, but just. things that really put a period on how cool we think we are, because some time, some time not too long ago, someone just like US thought that lord of the effing dance mug was cool, Michael Flatley in his little bullfighter jacket, dancing his ass off, believing every second of it. Crockery in every horrible shape and combination imaginable, fondue pots for ages, and the women’s shoes… i find walking down that isle quite bracing.
This place changes how i look at what i own, because everything in here was at one time a treasure that some man or woman worked to pay for, even the fruit basket with the leopard faux fir trim accents. Someone looked at that and said «you know, maybe the electric bill will have to come up a little short this month».

This is so great. Let me tell you — and I thrift a LOT.
Tiny shoulder Buddhas? GOT EM.
Hundreds of Barry Manilow albums? GOT EM.
Amazing comfy 7 foot long chaise that I should totally have bought but didn’t have the van and still regret not coming back to buy it even though God help me I have no place for it in my house? HAD IT.
Meat grinders? GOT EM.
Ceramic underglazed earrings that I MYSELF ACTUALLY MADE 20 years ago in Ballard where I met my husband priced at a bargain $ 4.50? GOT EM.
PLUS…so many crappy, ugly clothes OH MAN ALMOST FORGOT!
DICKIES!!! This place has like 20 different dickies!
There is everything you will ever want to find in a thrift store. Nah, you won’t find any Fleuvogs, but you might find a cool belt buckle.
Amazing. A true time-​warp of a place.

I am always on a hunt for a treasure… this thrift store is jammed packed of goodies. Seriously, the people that work here must spend tons of time filing and organizing as there are bins everywhere.
Did I end up buying anything? No. clothing seemed to be priced good but the rest of the things, such as household items and such were very inconsistent and high priced for a thrift store. For example, there were three plastic salad bowls. The small plastic one cost more than the large one and they were all from the same set.
I was also amazed how much of their space was devoted to $ 1.50 VHS movies. Really? a whole long isle that looked like you were in block buster’s.
People that worked at the store were very nice. Good selection of treasures, however they need to work on the pricing of what they have and adopt a consistent model.

Stopped in at Community Thrift on a recent trip to Whidbey Island. I’m not one for thrift stores, bu the person I went with was.
As we came in, I was amazed at how nice this place was. The outside is decorated with miscellaneous stuff like trikes, super soakers, toy horses all near the roof. Inside it’s really open, well organized and full of great stuff. Maybe it’s Seattle, but most thrift stores I’ve been to are picked through so that only crap remains. Community Thrift had tons of great stuff an a really nice staff. To top it off, it allsupports services for seniors. A must stop thrift store on your next jaunt through Whidbey Island.