St. Louis-Area Thrift Stores Ranked

By Monica Obradovic on Sat, Jul 22, 2023 at 4:52 pm

Thrift stores are great. They’re an affordable option for buying clothes, and they provide jobs and training for employees who may have a hard time finding jobs elsewhere. But not all thrift stores are created equal, unfortunately.

We sifted through bins of items caked in mysterious goo, combed through countless racks of clothes and even drove to the characterless suburbs of St. Charles County to find the best chain thrift stores in the St. Louis-area.

This list does not include antique shops and local institutions such as Found Vintage, Avalon Exchange and Found by the Pound. They’re clearly in a whole different (and better) league.

We wanted to sift through all the standard thrift stores — the Goodwills, the Savers, the St. Vincent de Pauls — so you could thrift efficiently. Here's our assessment, from worst to first.

Tags:

Scroll down to view images

Page 1 of 2

GOOGLE MAPS

Savers Crestwood
(9618 Watson Road)

This place is the worst. It’s crowded. It’s expensive. They know exactly what you want and punish you for it. We don’t care how nice the item or how fancy the label, you don’t ask someone to pay $15 for a used shirt with stains on it. Then they have the audacity to make you pay for a shopping bag. Get out of here with that for-profit nonsense. The Riverfront Times has selected the Crestwood Savers as the area’s Best Thrift Store multiple times because of its fine selection. Perhaps we’re somewhat responsible for the snake pit this place has become. Don’t give this place any of your time.

1 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Salvation Army Family Store Central West End
(4121 Forest Park Avenue)

We hate to hate this one. Money generated from Salvation Army’s thrift stores go toward the nonprofit’s multitude of charitable outreach programs, which brings this store’s placement a little further from the lowest of the low. Still, compared to other area thrift stores, this Salvation Army location is messy and the prices here seem generally higher than most other stores — not as high as Saver’s, though.

2 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

St. Vincent de Paul Florissant
(770 North Highway 67)

Don’t get us wrong, Society of St. Vincent de Paul thrift stores, as far as thrift store chains go, are generally better than others. The prices are lower, the furniture selection far more expansive, and charitable aspects more robust. Plus, according to the Society of St. Vincent de Paul’s website, it’s supported by a network of volunteers. What heroes. That said, this is still the worst St. Vincent de Paul thrift store compared to its sister stores. It’s oddly dark inside, and when we went, the shelves were sparse and it was dead quiet.

3 of 31

ROSALIND EARLY

Goodwill Brentwood
(9116 Manchester)

While Goodwill is more of a clothes-focused thrift store, we were still surprised to find this one didn’t have any homewares at all. Not a plate, or old record player or weird kitchen appliance to be found. It also didn’t have toys, books, or games. What did it have? Clothes, and lots of them. It does have a great shoe selection.

4 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

St. Vincent de Paul, St. Charles
(1069 Regency Parkway)

This is not worth the trip to St. Charles if you’re not from there.

5 of 31

ROSALIND EARLY

Goodwill Bella Villa
(4271 Bayless Avenue)

While we did find a cage to put your stuffing in, there wasn’t much else that stood out. This large, clean store was heavy on clothes and light on anything else, with a pathetic furniture section and sparse home goods. But if you never want to put stuffing in a turkey by hand again, it’s got you covered.

6 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Goodwill, St. Charles
(2420 West Clay Street)

There is nothing spectacular about this store and its parking lot sucks.

7 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Goodwill Ballwin
(14374 Manchester Avenue)

This Goodwill is about as dull as Manchester itself, but don’t sleep on the electronics case.

8 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Goodwill Chesterfield
(14808 Clayton Road)

Why does Chesterfield, one of the most affluent places in the area, have three Goodwills when the entire city of St. Louis has one? We see you, Goodwill. And we see this store specifically as the unremarkable fixture it is.

9 of 31

ROSALIND EARLY

St. Vincent de Paul Creve Coeur
(11015 Olive Boulevard)

While this St. Vincent de Paul is nicer than the one in Florissant, the sparse furniture selection and dirty floors left us less than impressed. On the plus side, it had a pretty good housewares selection, especially plates.

10 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Goodwill St. Peters
(620 Mid Rivers Mall Drive)

If you shop a lot at Goodwills in south or west St. Louis County, you’d think this Goodwill is a jewel from the outside. It looks brand-spankin’ new, has a luxuriously large parking lot all to itself, and has a drive-thru donation center to make dropping off items quick and easy. But she’s all looks and no personality. Kind of like St. Peters.

11 of 31

ROSALIND EARLY

Goodwill Sunset Hills
(10125 Watson Road)

This small Goodwill has some hidden gems like a telescope that we found for $50, or a picnic basket that included flatware and wine glasses. Mostly, though, this place had some unremarkable clothes and a few housewares.

12 of 31

ROSALIND EARLY

Goodwill Concord
(10570 Baptist Church Road)

This place has lots of kids items including a wide selection of toys and bikes. But other than that it's a big snooze. We think it’s a little strange, but if you’ll wear them it had a lot of second-hand bathing suits.

13 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Goodwill St. Peters
(3551 Harvester Road)

This Goodwill is spacious and clean but incredibly boring.

14 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Society of St. Vincent de Paul St. Ann
(10585 St. Charles Rock Road)

We’ve finally made our way past all the boring Goodwills and made it to the part of the list where stores start to get better. The St. Vincent de Paul in St. Ann may not be the best of the lot (it has very few men’s clothes and a sparse housewares section when we went), but its staff are friendly, and it plays hip-hop throughout the store instead of the typical pop playlists you hear in stores.

15 of 31

Goodwill O’Fallon
(1210 State Highway K)

This is a great Goodwill. It has larger furniture and art sections and it’s pristinely clean and organized.

16 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Salvation Army Family Store St. Peters
(30 Harvester Square)

This is the best thrift store in St. Charles County. The place is huge, but it’s very give or take. You could score big, but you could also walk out empty handed depending on the day. But odds are you’ll find something and pay less for it than you would at the Goodwill across the street. Also, any thrift store with fitting rooms, such as this one here, is higher up in our books.

17 of 31

MONICA OBRADOVIC

Salvation Army Florissant
(2200 North Highway 67)

Like every other thrift store in Florissant, this Salvation Army slaps. It’s also far above other Salvation Army locations in St. Louis. It’s huge (from the outside, it looks like a department store), and for some reason, this thrift store organizes its clothes not only by style but also color. It’s a treat to be here.

18 of 31

GOOGLE MAPS

Society of St. Vincent de Paul Mehlville
(2500 Lemay Ferry Road)

This is where all the old people in south St. Louis County deposit their junk — good junk, that is. We’re talking vintage clothes and board games, plaid couches from the ’70s that are cool now for some reason, vintage collectible glassware, and vinyl records whose covers smell kind of weird, but you want them anyway because they’re from good artists.

19 of 31

GOOGLE MAPS

Savers Ellisville
(15892 Clayton Road)

This place is always loaded.

20 of 31

Page 1 of 2

Search

St. Louis-Area Thrift Stores Ranked

Tags:

Trending in Arts & Culture