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Chester Town-Wide Tag Sale May 25

CHESTER - It’s time again for the Chester Town-Wide Tag Sale. It’s the annual event for which Chester residents survey their basements, attics, and garages to find those no-longer-necessary items that they can sell to their neighbors, other residents, and hundreds of visitors. In turn, it allows residents, neighbors, and visitors to purchase those can’t-live-without items at remarkable prices. Maybe best of all, Chester businesses join in, as well.

Beginning at 8 a.m. Saturday, May 25, Memorial Day Weekend, all the individual residences and businesses holding tag sales will be open for business throughout town. Each year the event attracts hundreds of visitors to Chester. Maps are available showing the location of all sales at individual residences and businesses and are distributed at the town center on the day of the event for $1. The event is “rain or shine.”

Last year, more than 80 individual residences and businesses were listed on the map and more than 500 maps were distributed. Organizers estimate that more than 1,000 buyers came to town that day.

“The Chester Town-wide Tag Sale offers buyers a concentration of sales at one convenient destination, increasing the buyer’s chances of finding that special piece that they just have to have. It’s a great way to spend a day of fun and relaxation, and it affords professional dealers an efficient day of shopping to replenish their inventories,” said Glenn Reyer, the event’s prior organizer. “Chester residents and businesses who wish to have a sale get the benefit of traffic volume that is rarely seen in Chester. For less than the cost of a single classified ad, sellers see a flow of buyers that they could not hope to achieve on their own. And the town as a whole benefits by getting all the tag sales over with on one day.”

The first such event of its kind in the Lower Connecticut River Valley, the Chester Town-Wide Tag Sale was started by a group of Chester merchants in the mid-’90s and was run by the merchants for several years. In 2003, the Chester Historical Society took over the event and ran it for the next seven years. This will be the Chester Republican Town Committee’s third year to organize the event and sign-ups are pouring in. Several other towns in the area now host similar events at other times of the year.

The organizers add this invitation to visitors, “When you’re done or if you just need a break, please stop by any one of our eight downtown restaurants for a cup of coffee, snack or really nice lunch…or you can just continue shopping in the downtown shops.”

To be listed on the map, sellers should send $10 to the Chester RTC, 248 Middlesex Ave., Chester, CT 06412, or visit the Century 21 office in Chester center. A tag sale seller must be a Chester resident or business and the sale address must be in Chester to be listed on the map.

Proceeds from listing fees, map sales, and advertising on the map are used to promote the event throughout Connecticut, to pay for extra police duty during the event, and to benefit the Chester Republican Town Committee’s general fund. For more information, contact Kris Seifert at 860-526-8440 or kris.seifert@gmail.com.