It’s hard for me to shake my prejudices against pawnshops. I can’t help but alternately associate them with George Lucas’ Watto and those Frontline episodes labeling pawnshops as your neighborhood drug money repository. Still, recession-era shifts in consumer attitudes are reinvigorating America’s formerly underground pawn economy and it’s worthwhile to take note of the swelling pawn empire: who’s borrowing, who’s buying and why?
We all know that charging high interest rates on brokered loans allow pawnshops to cut great deals on just about anything, from high quality jewelry and sports equipment to consumer electronics. And just this year, stores here in Denver reported holiday sales spikes of 40% and the 3 publicly traded U.S. pawnshops reported net incomes up at least 25%. It makes sense that those of us looking for ways to save have found ourselves checking the pawnshops for our kids’ band instruments or anniversary gifts.
As always, I’d recommend staying aware of predatory lending whether it’s a bank or a pawnbroker. But check out my latest consumer infographic on the trend you might be missing out on:
Can you please create a separate site or section of your site for these. Otherwise I will be forced to unsubscribe.
Whoops, my RSS said there was one post, and I clicked over to comment and found another. Maybe it’s coming later?
Kacie, other post released a little early. Will be out tomorrow morning.
Cool! I wrote about the same topic a few weeks ago, so I’ll be back to comment
Another cool infographic Jason. Funny that pawn is the 2nd oldest profession – probably started to help guys afford the world oldest profession.
Amazing infographics work. A picture indeed is worth thousand words. It’s so informative and engaging to quickly learn facts with fun.
Shilpan
What average american makes $2000.00 a week take home pay ??? I sure don’t know anybody with that kind of job !!!
Bad research paper:
http://www.law.umich.edu/centersandp…2008/miles.pdf
A much better viewpoint (and more current research) can be found at:
http://www.cops.usdoj.gov/html/cd_ro…ecklenburg.pdf
Not only is it funded and implemented by a police agency, it’s more current (2001) and refutes a link between the presence of pawnshops and an increase in property crime.
love the infographics on your site,ive even taken the liberty of adding a few on my own .Its sucha shift from plain ol’ text
Well, that’s tempting me to open a pawn shop.