By Local lovers of second-hand treasures joined together for a day filled with food, drinks, live music and vintage shopping on March 16, for Long Beach State’s Thrift Club’s “Good Sunday Flea Market,” held at Good Times Cafe.
Just two miles from campus, Good Time Cafe is a frequent spot for CSULB students.
Their menu features baked goods, breakfast items, coffee, specialty drinks, as well as beer and wine.
According to Olivia Paine, a fourth-year merchandise major and the vice president of Thrift Club, the cafe offered to host the flea market alongside the club.
“Good Time has always been a lot of our member’s favorite spot to go to, to just get coffee, do homework, the staff here is really nice,” Paine said. “It’s a great way to help them get more exposure and business as well as bring more exposure to thrift club.”
While not the size of a regular flea market, the event featured a variety of booths with different products for purchase in the lot next to Good Times Cafe.
As the namesake of the club may imply, most of the products that were offered were thrifted clothing and accessories, prominently featuring Y2K and streetwear styles.
Selling their own selection of curated vintage and streetwear at the event was Erik Almendarez, an incoming business major at the Beach.
VHS, belt buckles and cassettes were offered in addition to clothing at Erik Almendarez’s booth on March 16. Photo credit: Joshua Flores
Almendarez, who sells under the tag @MiddlemanLA on Instagram, said he chose to sell at the market to gain more experience in networking and business management.
“I wanted to come out and meet a new clientele and come and support Cal State Long Beach,” he said. “I did the previous thrift club event and I kept in touch and just signed up for this one.”
Almendarez said that he has been collecting clothing for eight years and entered the market of selling thrifted goods last year.
A look inside Good Time Cafe, that hosted the Thrift Club flea market held on March 16. Photo credit: Joshua Flores
Like Almendarez, Jarod Mangaoang was also a featured vendor at the event under his thrift shop pop-up, called Fixional.
Co-owned by Mangaoang and Tia Fernandez, an elementary education major at Pierce College, the two market on their Instagram and the popular second-hand shopping site, Depop.
“We saw it was a new flea and we wanted to support it especially since its run by Cal State Long Beach, we figured we wanted support them [because] it’s student run,” Mangaoang said. “We knew it was a smaller event going into it and we figured it was just gonna be fun and nice to meet new vendors and customers and what their club was about too.”
Fixional, Fernandez said, initially came from her buying an abundance of items while thrifting for years.
Mangaoang had the idea of creating a pop-up shop, and since then, Fernandez said their pieces are curated with love and are sold across their digital shops and events.
According to Paine, the Thrift Club plans to host more events like this one to promote the club and student engagement. Future event announcements can be found on their Instagram.
“It’s gonna be a good time,” Paine said. “It’s a great way to meet new people too and to grow the community.”
