A scout is someone associated with a
secondhand shop who procures merchandise and brings it to the shop, thus saving the owners and employees the time and
labor of this necessary task. In return, the scout gets either a small amount of money, a larger amount of
store credit, or sometimes just a general sense of
well-being.
In addition to performing a valuable function, the scout also contributes heavily to the sense of the store as a gathering place, and not just a market - like an ancient agora. He will usually spend more time there than is strictly necessary to complete his business, chat with customers to find out what they want, and develop meaningful relationships with the shopkeepers. This helps the good scout insure that after lugging everything to the transaction point, he can actually leave it there and not have to find somewhere else to dump it.
Scouts generally have a lot of free time on their hands, so they can scour all the spots where goods are likely to be found for little or no money - curbs on trash day, the city dump, yard sales, library sales, etc. They often have their best luck at sales by going towards the end and offering to buy what's left over for a ridiculously low amount of money. If you offer to transport it from the premises, it can even be often had for free.