What "theme related" lockers have you bought?

Sometimes (over time) you will see a locker which has a "theme".

It might be any of the following or one you suggest:

1) all car stuff
2) all crafting stuff
3) all construction related
4) all "stripper" stuff
5) all closed store stuff (bins, racks, merchandise)
6) all nursing home (beds, lifts, walkers)

7) all....you tell us

As tangent of this question, do you actually LOOK for such lockers as opposed to the general home lockers we mostly see?

I once bought a unit that had an entire daycare in it. Everything from the cubby holes to the fax machine. Because new daycare furniture is so expensive, the resale market for it is excellent.

Tools and resalable retail products are what I look for. Standard household units are the ones I avoid.

I may have mentioned it before, but I once bought two lockers (for the cost of $1) full of the big bulky computer monitors - On pallets and wrapped in plastic. I scrapped every single one, pulling out the copper, cutting cords, and what metal I could gather. After many trips to the scrap yard and a lot of hard work, I'd estimate the profits to be over 2K - Over the course of many months after a $1 investment.

We all have certain things we look for, but a good deal is the same regardless of the content.

Here's a pic.

I once bought a 12'x30' locker with 12' ceilings.  It was an entire contracting business that had closed down and the owner had thrown all his tools and tons of materials in this unit and defaulted.  Unfortunately this was before I started keeping pictures of all my cool finds. 

The facility actually let us have a garage sale out of it for three days.  It was awesome, sold 7k worth of stuff (only paid 1k for the locker) before we even had to move anything out.  Instead of having to move truckload after truckload of tools and equipment and lumber and racking, we got to move a couple truck and trailer loads along with a pile of benjamins...

I got multiple air compressers......emglo and dewalt.  I got 20 plus battery operated tool kits....a huge knaack job box that I literally filled to the top with just battery tools, drills, saws, corded tools, etc.  Big drill press, lots of lumber, plumbing, electrical, etc.  It was a big project, but it paid off very well......we were still selling items off over a year later! 

I bought another locker at that facility a couple of years later and got another unit where the guy did nothing but commercial bathrooms.  Got five brand new in box hand dryers....you know, the electric ones you mount on the wall and push the button and it blows hot air to dry your hands.  Battery operated tools.  Tons of stainless steel kick plates for the bottoms of bathroom doors, stainless handles, door closers, soap dispensers and paper towel dispensers, all brand new in box stuff.  Pallet racking, three big propane powered bullet heaters (I think I have pictures of some of the stuff out of this locker in one of my old postings somewhere...MM?)......lot's of electrical stuff, tools, carts, etc.  Another great locker and I only paid $300 for it.....bunch of other auctions that day and hardly anybody showed up to this one! 

I've had others.....concrete contractor.....thrift stores (for some reason a LOT of those go out of business and then default on their inventory.....lol)....Commercial kitchen equipment.......guy that made and sold all kinds of supplies for Mason Bees....some weird stuff, but a profitable locker...........Bakery/Candy store......dressmaker with totes and totes of materials and patterns and sewing machines and dress dummies, etc......commercial fire sprinkler system guy with tons of orange fittings and pipe and a bunch of ladders and tools..........cabinet maker with saws, planers, jointers, etc.  It goes on if you have been doing this awhile.......especially the "pre show" era.......only a couple of those have been in the last two years!

That is outstanding to be able to make 2k out of that mess.

I would have never thought there was that much useable scrap in that picture.

That was one of two identical lockers, and also the low investment price helped! The first one I bought for a dollar, the second one I 'volunteered' to clean out.

Haunted house locker.  12'x30'x12'.  One of the regulars teased me about it last month asking if I had survived moving all of it and losing money. 

He stopped when we told him we'd turned it around in 3 days for 1K, paid $50.

Im not sure we should have said anything...but the look on his face was worth it.

Some of you may know this story.. I bought a rented space that was used for band rehearsal. Worst locker I had ever bought. I could have saved the framing and sold it, but didn't have the space or a contact for the materials. I pulled an amp with no head but decent speakers, some small PA speakers and some space heaters and an AC unit, but that's about it. Paid $50, made $150. Spent a week cleaning it out.. blah..

Rooms I look for has signs of either vintage collectible type stuff or kid stuff. Kid stuff goes fast on Craigslist and vintage collectibles look cool in my storefront window!