[denalipop]

We'll be moving to Nelson in a few weeks, and will be shipping very little stuff along with us (mostly electronics). We plan to buy our furniture on trademe, but will still need to buy "little" stuff like food, clothes, cleaning supplies, etc.

In the States, there are Goodwill, "dollar stores", and discount stores that specialize in dented box / slightly expired food which also sell other ultra-cheap stuff.

Are there equivalent cheap/discount stores in Nelson? Is there a stigma attached to those stores?

[BkyMonster]

No idea on Nelson specifically, but you can try this to see if there are secondhand shops (opshops) around http://www.opshopdirectory.co.nz/
In my experience there are dollar stores in most places. Bin Inn also carries some of the dollar store stuff and may have lower cost (bulk) cleaners and stuff that might be considered US dollar store fare. It's not as cheap as similar things were in the US though. http://www.bininn.co.nz/
No Goodwill, though there is Salvation Army and St. Vincent dePaul. These, and other secondhand shops I've been into are mainly clothes, with the odd piece of furniture. Not much in the way of dishes,housewares etc at all. (The Warehouse is fairly reasonable for this actually)
Haven't seen anywhere with slightly expired food tbh. Warehouse again has decent prices for some canned/dry goods over the supermarkets. I for one buy tuna there as it is generally 50c less per can than Countdown.
Nothing like BigLots or similar. TradeMe kind of fills this market niche as well. :D

[thezorbster]

There are secondhand/charity shops around plus second hand furniture shops (biggish one on Bridge Street). As BkyMonster mentioned, the warehouse does various items of food/toiletries etc reasonably cheaply and they are also good for basic bits of household stuff, cheap electricals etc (not really big name brands though). There's also a local version of a magazine called buy/sell/swap which has second hand stuff in. I'd say there's no stigma attached in second hand goods - it's what people do over here.

[mussomutts]

There's a big shop on Quarantine Rd (??) in Tahuna (It's been a while since I've been there,)called Save Mart which is a big warehouse of second hand clothes (It will be my first stop when I get back!!!!) I can't wait to be back in a country where there is no stigma about second handies!! haha Canada looks down on me completely for my love of op shopping!!

[denalipop]

Thanks for the tips! I look forward to checking out those places when I get there. :)

[mgbridges]

You could also try the Freecycle group in Nelson: http://www.freecycle.org/group/NZ/New%20Zealand/Nelson I haven't 'Freecycled' anything here myself yet but I did in the UK and it worked really well.

The Warehouse is a good place to start for fairly cheap items but if you want slightly better quality you could look out for sales at Briscoes or Farmers.

Good luck getting everything set up!
Anneliese