GARAGE SALE ARTICLES

Yard sale health and safety

The last thing you need at a yard sale is for one of your customers to do themselves an injury.

So, before you open your gates, it pays to have a first aid kit, and if possible a qualified first aid practitioner, handy.

But when it comes to safety, as ever, an ounce of prevention saves a pound of cure. So here's a few tips to help you mensure your yard is nice and safe when your visitors come streaming through the gates.

A couple of hours before your sale you should check your yard to ensure:

1. there’s no low-lying tree branches that people or children can walk into.
2. all electrical cables or cords are concealed so there’s no possibility that your visitors (especially any children) can come in contact with a live lead.
3. there’s nothing lying on the ground (like kids’ toys) that people can trip over - especially in the main path from your street to the sale.
4. that any hot surfaces (such as a barbeque plate) are supervised by an adult at all times.
5. that, if you have a swimming pool, it has a child-proof lock and the gate is shut.
6. all your vehicles are locked and the park brakes are firmly on.
7. any animals you have are appropriately tethered and not able to reach your visitors.
8. that none of the advertising or stalls for your sale block drivers’ sight lines as they’re pulling up to your yard.
9. all your garden and power tools are securely locked away.
10. your house and garden is in good repair so that things like heavy tree fruits or loose eave panels are unlikely to fall on visitors’ heads.

Finally, you should personally conduct at least two checks of all the above while the sale is running, just to make sure that none of the conditions you checked at the start of the day have changed.

Sounds like a lot to consider, right? Well, if like most people, your house and yard are in good working order, you’ll be able to finish your safety audit very quickly.

If on the other hand your house or yard needs a safety upgrade, an upcoming yard sale is the perfect excuse to do it. Safety after all is imperative, not just for your visitors, but also for your family.