Hundreds of yard sales are held in every corner of the Maritimes each weekend, but a regional landfill held a gigantic sale in Saint John on Saturday.

Marc Macleod doesn't play guitar, but he’s selling one along with the amp to go with it and about 1,000 other items at the sale.

“The term in our industry is always the throwaway society,” says MacLeod from the Fundy Waste Commission.

Crane Mountain Landfill staff say they’ve collected a lot of items that shouldn’t have been thrown away and this is best opportunity to give the public a chance to buy secondhand items for reasonable prices.

"Garbage really should be the last resort and I think sometimes people think it's the first option,” MacLeod says.

Antique radios in working condition, plenty of furniture, golf clubs, pet carriers, tires and even the kitchen sink were set up for the sale.

It’s the first time the Fundy Solid Waste Commission has collected materials for sale and staff say it’s an eye-opener, even for those who have worked at the landfill for almost 20 years.

"We just look around here and I just shake my head at the amount of stuff we collected in just a short time,” says employee, Chris Harned. “That's right, all of this stuff was collected in a little over a month.”

Harned says he didn’t notice all of the materials in great condition going into the landfill until the staff started collecting it.

"You really don't pay attention until you start to collect it and once it starts to gather, it sets home that one person's trash is another person's treasure,” he says.

The pilot project started because it would cost millions to open a new cell in the landfill. Staff says the more trash that’s reused or recycled and the longer the landfill lasts will result in more savings for tax payers. 

"We thought we'd give it a shot, but we'd start small,” says MacLeod. “It's not too small, three tractor trailer loads.”

The landfill’s gates opened at 8 a.m. and everything was on final sale.

"No offer will be refused because we really don't want to pack it back up and send it to the landfill,” MacLeod says.

With files from CTV Atlantic’s Mike Cameron.