One day while on business travel, I found myself killing a little time in a local store. I found a wonderful shirt. The shirt was a great deal and I decided my husband would love the shirt.  I bought the shirt and brought it home with me when I returned to town.

I was so pleased, and so was he…right up until he saw the size…I had purchased the wrong size.  Ooops!  No problem. I’m clearly NOT flying back to the place I purchased the shirt. Rather, I simply decided to sell it on eBay.

Prepare my Auction Listing

I took my photos and folded the shirt.  As I folded it, I noticed a BIG black mark on the back of the sleeve! Darn! Now what?

I had a few options.

• I could list it as "NWT but with a mark that MIGHT come out with washing"
• I could launder it and sell it as "NWOT"  -- providing the mark came out.
• I could donate it to my local charity

This is what I did and what you can try, should you find yourself in a similar situation.

The stain was on the sleeve of a cotton blend shirt. It will not work for ALL fabrics.

My method

• sprayed the mark with Clorox OxyClean (Non-bleach) in accordance with the directions
• waited 4 minutes
• ran the tap water in the sink at the hottest temperature (this shirt was cotton blend)
• washed the shirt sleeve ONLY under the running hot water
• watched as the mark washed away
• laid the sleeve flat on paper towels to absorb most of the water
• placed the NWT shirt into the dryer on delicate setting (tags still attached)
• added a fabric softener sheet
• ran the shirt for 20 minutes on this delicate cycle

My results:

• A beautiful, stain-free shirt
• Still New With Tags (they were never moist and were in no way damaged by the dryer on the delicate cycle)
• I was able to honestly offer my NWT shirt for sale on eBay.
• And it sold …
• and my customer was HAPPY!!! 

I hope this guide has been helpful to you and that you too will be able to make sure your NWT items are sellable on eBay.