Secondhand pricing looks random from the outside. It follows from how a store gets its inventory, what it pays its staff, and what the sale is meant to fund.
Donation flow determines the baseline
A store that receives more donations than it can display has to move goods quickly, and low prices are the mechanism for clearing space.
Stores with thinner intake price higher because each item must earn more, and because empty racks discourage the browsing that drives sales.
Seasonal swings in donations, particularly after holidays and during moving season, therefore show up as visible price changes on the floor.
Sorting labor is the largest cost
Every donated bag has to be opened, inspected, cleaned, categorized, priced and shelved, and unsellable items must be disposed of at the store's expense.
Paid staff make this predictable but expensive; volunteer labor lowers cost and introduces inconsistency in how similar items are valued.
A store that prices by category rather than by item is choosing speed over accuracy, which is why a designer jacket can sit on a rack at the same price as a plain one.
Charitable and commercial models diverge
Some thrift stores fund a charity's programs directly, and pricing is set to maximize revenue for those programs.
Others fund employment training, where the store is partly a workplace and the operation is judged on people trained as much as on margin.
For-profit resale chains buy inventory or pay per pound and must cover rent and payroll from sales alone, which raises prices.
Online resale changed what gets shelved
Items with reliable secondhand demand are increasingly identified during sorting and listed online rather than placed on the floor.
That practice raises revenue and reduces the chance of an unusual find in the store, which changes the browsing experience shoppers remember.
It also means the pricing a customer sees reflects what was left after a triage step they never observe.
Location does the rest
Rent, local incomes and the quality of nearby donations move together, so stores in affluent neighborhoods carry better goods and charge more for them.
Chains sometimes redistribute inventory between stores, sending goods where they will sell rather than leaving them where they were donated.
The result is a market that behaves like any other retail market, shaped by supply and location rather than by a single charitable standard.