Consignment Stores Offer Big Brands

RINKER BUCK

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Now here's a cure for that teenage fashionista of yours who feels bitten by the recession.

At Uptown Consignment in South Windsor — a renovated former CVS store which owner Barbara Capenera believes is the largest single consignment store in the country — that pinched fashion plate of yours can earn an instant $10 for her Seven jeans, or $30 for her Citizen's Humanity or True Religions.

Uptown's "Cash For Your Jeans" promotion, advertised on WKSS-FM and on the front cover of the Rare Reminder shopper, is just one of the sophisticated marketing practices that has made consignment stores some of the busiest retail locations in recession-era suburban Hartford. ...