But if you're looking for something used (some of it very used), the Surplus With A Purpose store, better known as the SWAP Shop, has new digs and better organized space for shoppers to scour.

At one time located Downtown, and then at 2102 Wright St. on Madison's East Side, the store since October has occupied part of a 110,000-square-foot building in the Verona Technology Park.

Located near the intersection of highways PB and M on Verona's southeast side, the shop is about the same size and distance from the UW-Madison campus as the Wright Street location but provides better organization.

"I love this new space," said Matt Thies, who manages the shop, which is essentially an on-going rummage sale put on by the state. "We're still moving in. When we moved here, we just threw things in here and now it's a matter of putting things where they belong."

The shop, at 1061 Thousand Oaks Trail, shares a building with Materials Distribution Services, a state agency that buys office supplies and other items in bulk and sells them to other government agencies.

At the SWAP Shop, laptop computers sans hard drives, go for $10 and can be found stacked in the first aisle. Metal desks, most priced between $20 and $30 are in aisle 6 while plastic letter trays for 10 cents are in aisle 3.

Because there is better space, items aren't so quickly discarded to the recycling pile or landfill, Thies said. A large back storage area, off limits to customers, holds hundreds of more items waiting to hit the shelves.

The inflatable Bucky Badger, which towers over the front part of the store, is not for sale. Neither is the popcorn machine or the wood-and-glass cases that hold some of the smaller items for the store's online auction.

"People are always asking about those," said cashier Linda Aaberg, who retired three years ago after 38 years in the UW-Madison mechanical engineering department. She likes the new space, even if it is farther from her East Side home. "This building has windows. It's brighter and cheerier."

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