Just off the busy retail stretch of Perkiomen Avenue in Reading, Pennsylvania, A Second Time Around has built its business around a straightforward proposition: designer and better label clothing at a fraction of its original price, sourced through consignment rather than mass donation bins. The shop, located at 3001 Perkiomen Avenue, carries both new-with-tags pieces and gently used designer apparel alongside shoes, boots, coats, purses, jewelry, and accessories, giving shoppers a single stop that spans a full wardrobe rather than one narrow category of secondhand goods.
The store’s hours reward planning ahead rather than a spontaneous drop-in on the wrong day. It is open Tuesday through Friday from 11am to 5pm and Saturday from 10am to 5pm, but stays closed Sunday and Monday, a schedule more common to boutique consignment operations than big box retailers that run seven days a week. That rhythm suits its core audience: shoppers who treat consignment browsing as a deliberate errand, checking back periodically as new items rotate onto the racks rather than expecting a static inventory.
What separates a shop like A Second Time Around from a general thrift store is its emphasis on labels that already carry recognizable value: designer and better label pieces priced well under their original retail tags, rather than an unsorted mix of whatever happens to get donated. That focus means the racks lean toward pieces shoppers would recognize from department store price tags, just at a resale markdown, which is precisely the appeal for anyone chasing name brand quality without paying full retail. Coats and outerwear get particular attention in the store’s own description of its inventory, a detail that matters in a market like Berks County, where a proper winter coat is a practical necessity rather than an optional accessory.
Reading itself sits along the Schuylkill River in Berks County, and Perkiomen Avenue is one of the city’s longer commercial corridors, lined with a mix of independent retail, restaurants, and service businesses that draw both city residents and commuters from the surrounding suburbs. A consignment shop positioned along that corridor benefits from steady daytime traffic without needing to compete directly with a downtown shopping district, giving it a natural base of repeat local customers who build the habit of checking in every few weeks for new arrivals.
The store maintains an active online presence to complement its physical location, posting updates and new arrivals so that regular customers can get a preview before making the trip to Perkiomen Avenue in person. For anyone building or refreshing a wardrobe on a budget, particularly one that leans toward name brand pieces rather than fast fashion, that combination of in person browsing and online previews offers a practical way to shop consignment without wasting a trip on a day when nothing new has come in.
Summed up simply: A Second Time Around is a Reading, Pennsylvania consignment shop at 3001 Perkiomen Avenue selling new and gently used designer clothing, shoes, coats, purses, jewelry, and accessories, open Tuesday through Saturday for shoppers looking for recognizable labels at a fraction of retail price.
