Online Sales, Local Finds: The Rustic Market on 1st Keeps Vintage Treasures Moving

eBay store helps support downtown vendor marketplace and holiday shopping in McCook’s Creative District

McCOOK, Neb. — On most days at The Rustic Market on 1st, you’ll find owner Tammy Stevens doing a quiet juggling act—greeting customers, answering vendor questions, and, in between, carefully wrapping a glass cookie jar or vintage sewing machine to ship halfway around the world.

What many people don’t realize is that behind the cozy vendor booths and antique displays, there’s a full-time eBay operation helping keep the doors open on West 1st Street.

“Thanksgiving Day 2020 was my first sale,” said James Stevens. “It was a pair of shoes.”

Back then, James was working second shift and spending his mornings at home. Like a lot of resellers, he fell into the business through YouTube, watching videos of people thrifting and flipping their finds online.

“I go to the thrift store all the time,” he said. “So I started thinking, if I’m already there, I should look for stuff. Then I learned how to do it, what to do. We just started out in the garage.”

For a while, it was a side hustle—listings squeezed in before work and on weekends. Tammy didn’t really join in until 2023, when a job change pushed her into full-time caregiving for their son and full-time eBay selling from home. As the business grew, so did the inventory, and the couple tested the idea of having a presence in town with a booth at Plants by Ashley.

They quickly outgrew that space. In February 2025, they took the leap and opened The Rustic Market on 1st, combining their online business with a brick-and-mortar vendor marketplace.

Today, the Stevens’ eBay shop quietly reaches buyers far beyond McCook.

“You can reach 134 million people on eBay,” James said. “We ship International. We’ve shipped to Italy, Japan, Australia, England, Kazakhstan—all over the world.”

At the same time, the local store serves a much smaller but very real audience: people who walk in from the thrift store next door, shoppers in the Creative District, grandparents looking for stocking stuffers, and collectors hunting for one card, one book or one glass piece to finish a set.

Shipping, “death piles,” and vintage surprises

While James focuses on sourcing and numbers sell-through rates, margins, and what’s worth picking up—Tammy has become the in-house packing expert.

“We get a lot of compliments on our shipping,” James said. “People are a little surprised sometimes, like, ‘Wow, this thing was really taken care of.’ We have the same philosophy of, how would I want it if someone shipped this to me, whether it’s a football card or a glass cookie jar.”

They use calculated shipping and online postage discounts to help cover the costs of tape, boxes, and bubble wrap. The small savings add up.

“If they paid $12 in shipping, it might only cost us $9,” James explained. “That $3 helps pay for our tape and boxes and bubble wrap and all that other expense.”

Like most resellers, they also have what’s known as a “death pile”—inventory that’s been bought but not yet listed. A recent donation made that “pile” a lot bigger. A man who had been moving repeatedly showed up with a small U-Haul full of vintage sewing machines.

“He said, ‘I can’t take them with me again. I just can’t,’” Tammy said. “He told us he was just going to donate them all. He said he had 40 or 50. He showed up with a small U-Haul, and there was probably closer to 100.”

Half the machines are still in the Stevens’ cargo trailer, the other half at home, waiting for their turn in the eBay queue. Some have already sold.

“You can’t hardly say no when it’s free inventory,” James said. “We just plug it in to see if it operates. At these prices, we can blow them out and keep them cheap. It’s a little bit heavy to ship, but people pay shipping.”

Beyond sewing machines, the couple has handled everything from collectible cards and video games to vintage T-shirts and even unopened, decades-old department store underwear.

“Vintage packaged underwear sold for $80,” James said with a laugh.

There have also been a few unforgettable flips—like the time a used Furby in its original box, bought for $5 at a thrift store, sold at auction for $300 and shipped to Japan.

Connecting people with memories

For the Stevens, the fun of eBay isn’t just the profit. It’s the stories that come back from buyers.

James remembers a Minnesota Twins hat he found and listed. When it sold, the buyer sent a photo of a full, vintage Twins uniform the hat belonged with.

“He’d been looking for that hat for a while,” James said. “It completed the ensemble. He was so excited.”

In another case, a woman messaged them about a hat from a Canadian resort. Her parents had owned the resort years earlier, and she routinely checks eBay to see if anything from that place appears.

“She was so excited to get that for the memories,” James said. “Connecting people with those things—it’s fun. It’s really neat to be able to find those things, the nostalgia, for those people and for us.”

That sense of second chances and second lives runs through their business. They’re conscious, too, of keeping usable items out of landfills—from sewing machines to old graphic T-shirts and electronics.

“Things end up in the landfill,” Tammy said. “Even sewing machines—people throw stuff like that away. We’re doing our best to keep them alive and back in circulation.”

eBay keeps the lights on—and the local shop open

Running an online store doesn’t mean every day is easy. The Stevens deal with the occasional scammer, returns, and the learning curve that comes with shipping fragile items across the country. Still, the structure they’ve built—clear descriptions, a 30-day money-back policy, and willingness to own their mistakes—has helped them maintain strong feedback and repeat customers.

On the local side, foot traffic can be unpredictable. There have been days with no sales in the shop at all.

“There have been days we’ve had zero sales,” Tammy said. “We sit here and think, ‘Okay, did we make a mistake? Will this be able to sustain? Will we be able to continue?’”

Right now, the answer lies in that balance between online and in-person.

“The shop is staying open because of eBay,” James said. “If we wanted to cut ties, we’d be making a lot more money on eBay. But it’s enough to help keep this open, to keep something here for everybody. We’re here for the vendors.”

Those vendors—ranging from books and fair-trade goods to coins, cards, antiques, handmade items and more—are what make The Rustic Market on 1st feel like a mini-mall for local entrepreneurs.

“If it wasn’t for us, a lot of these littler businesses wouldn’t be here,” Tammy said. “All of these guys, we wouldn’t have these shops individually. They work full-time jobs, they have families. This gives them a place to do business without having to sit here all day.”

-A holiday must-stop in the Creative District

As the holiday season unfolds in McCook’s Creative District, The Rustic Market on 1st offers a different kind of shopping experience—part treasure hunt, part community hub.

Shoppers can find:

• Vintage glassware and antiques

• Local books and gifts from independent vendors

• Sports cards and Pokemon singles

• Clothing and accessories

• Fair-trade goods supporting women overcoming poverty and trafficking

• Seasonal décor and one-of-a-kind curiosities

The shop also offers gift cards that can be used with any vendor in the store—an easy option if you’re not sure whether the person on your list wants a vintage cookie jar, Disney VHS nostalgia, or a stack of football cards.

“You might come in for one thing and find something completely different,” Tammy said. “We’re a unique store. If people would come in and give us a chance, I think they could find something.”

While their eBay sales connect them to buyers around the globe, the Stevens say they’re still happy to help someone down the street ship a gift to a relative out of state, or track down a specific card or collectible.

In that way, The Rustic Market on 1st is both bigger and smaller than it looks: a local shop anchored in McCook’s Creative District, powered by a global marketplace—and a couple who still take the time to pack each box like they’re sending it to a neighbor.

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For current hours, holiday specials, and updates from the vendors, shoppers can follow “The Rustic Market on 1st” on Facebook.