Buying & Selling Tips

More great tips from Avril Harper

Buying

• Always haggle with sellers, even for low value, high resale items. A caudle cup, priced at £5, haggled to £3, resold in Edinburgh recently for many thousands of pounds.

• At fairs, in shops, as a trader or not (but don’t get caught out telling lies), say ‘Trade’ and expect a ten per cent discount or more.

• Arrive early at fairs, swapmeets, markets, before other dealers get first pick of bargain goods and miracle finds. Again, say you’re trade, even if you’re not, and gain admission long before the doors open to the public.

• Look for items now sold individually which were originally issued in sets: some postcards, cigarette cards, some books. Find one and chances are the remainder are lurking alongside. For example, our researcher Peter Allan tells how, at a northern flea market he spotted a postcard showing what looked like part of Christ’s face, followed soon by cards depicting other body parts - feet, hands, legs. Eventually finding 12 cards he realised they fitted together, in jigsaw fashion, to form Christ’s body, with each card focusing on important events in the life of the Messiah. The cards, costing 20p each, were part of a ‘composite set’, sometimes worth hundreds of pounds at auction.

• Look for No. 1 issues of most magazines, comics, newspapers. Recently first copies of Batman, Superman and Beatles comics have fetched staggering sums at auction.

• Look for items which are poor sellers in one area with high potential demand in another. Santa Claus postcards, for example, are hugely popular in America but just another postcard theme in Britain.

• Learn about most desirable and high price collectable makes and makers in your chosen field. Steiff for teddy bears, artists such as Kirchner and Mucha for glamour postcards and prints, Sutcliffe for early topographical photographs, Corgi for toys, etc.

• While searching other people’s attics for miracle finds, don’t overlook your own. My business selling postcards and paper ephemera started with seventeen cards sent by my grandfather during the First World War. You never know what you have until you look!

• Look for goods to buy in bulk which can be dismantled and sold individually. Though still presenting competition from fellow dealers at auction or other selling venue, most collectors avoid buying in bulk when just a few items interest them.

• Postcards and stamps frequently come in bulk, in albums, as do boxes of books, toys, ephemera, and such. Likewise job lots, unwanted collections, and so on. For a recent example, the sale of items belonging to the late Catherine Cookson featured hundreds of individual pieces, alongside trays and boxes packed with smaller less valuable goods, the likes of books, cutlery, small ornaments. For a few pounds per lot northern dealers acquired boxloads of items belonging to the north’s most famous and best-loved daughter which were quickly cleaned, priced, and sold individually at flea markets, boot sales and from ads. in regional newspapers.

Selling

• Decide whether to trade direct to the public, say at flea markets, collectors’ fairs, car boot sales, or to trade by post via auction resellers, on approval to known trusted past customers, through advertisements in specialist magazines, or by inviting buyers to call to view items on your premises.

• Write a book or articles, get interviewed on television and radio, about your special interest. Establish yourself as an expert and wait for your letterbox to be flooded with offers from buyers and sellers.

• Be fair, and hospitable to everyone. Develop a reputation for reliability and fair-dealing and be the one buyers and sellers turn to first.

• Have business cards printed giving your name, address and telephone number (remember to have the premises burglar-alarmed when giving precise details) and your chosen buying and selling speciality. Hand cards out to buyers and sellers, and leave plenty on your stall at flea markets and collectors’ fairs. Most people like to spend time thinking before inviting you to inspect, value and buy their goods. Others, often first-time visitors, are unaware that some items are collectable and rarely carry such items around, preferring potential buyers to call to view.

• Advertise in general and special interest collectibles magazines, such as general ‘Collectables’ and ‘Collect it!’, ‘Picture Postcard Monthly’ and ‘Stamps’ for special interest.

• Compile a valuable mailing list - free of charge - from sellers and collectors listed in magazines, newsletters and club membership lists.

• Most successful collectors and dealers know there’s a right time to sell their goods, and it can take years. A good example is vintage postcards (pre-1914) which, until the mid-eighties, could be purchased for pennies and sold for pounds at collectors’ fairs and specialist auctions. Come the nineties’ recession, spending on luxuries diminished, the bottom fell from the postcard market, and traders were hard-pushed to make ends meet. But, as the economy strengthens, luxury spending is back, and those who held onto their cards should soon see their patience rewarded.

• Consider various methods of marketing your goods, both direct to buyers at flea markets and collectors’ fairs, and by mail order, direct mail, on approval, by special invitation to view, through agents, at auction, and so on.

• Make items appealing to collectors and non-collectors. For example, advertisements and prints from magazines can be mounted, framed, and sold from stalls at collectors’ fair or flea market, or direct to hoteliers, shops, restaurants, and other potential bulk-buyers of decorative items.

• Look for less-obvious ways to market your goods to people with potential to buy. Dog cards and memorabilia, for instance, can be sold at dog shows; similarly cat-related products at cat shows, motoring memorabilia at car shows and motoring swapmeets.

• Keep similar items together on your stall or in catalogue and sales lists. Extensive stocks of similar items, say teddies, advertising postcards, can be sold separately through advertisements or catalogues, cost less to target than wide-ranging offers to general collectors, and make it likely people will purchase in bulk.

• Start a newsletter or club for enthusiasts of your specialist area. A small fee you charge to attract thousands of potential subscribers is a pittance to sales you’ll achieve later to your own highly targetable niche audience. For example, Brian Wood Ceramics, specialist in hand-decorated collectable pottery pieces, recently launched its own collectors’ club, costing around £15 a year for a regular newsletter, a set of Art Deco salt and pepper pots, a special one-off gift, and, most importantly, priority to limited editions. Likewise, the Cherished Teddy Club issues newsletters, gifts, membership (actually membearship) lapel pins, and first chance to buy four limited designs issued each year.

• Hawk goods around specialist fairs, such as fairs focusing on stamps and postcards, dolls and toys, railwayana, etc., etc., etc. You don’t have to take a stall to profit fast. Offer goods to all appropriate dealers in the room, compare offers and consider selling to the highest bidder. Special interest - shocked faces, dealers’ eyes following you round the room - should be treated with caution and goods valued by outside experts with a view to selling at specialist auction.

Security

• Be on your guard against customers and sellers at fairs and other selling venues and, sadly, I have to say ‘trust no-one’. At a fair in Newcastle I left my pile of newly acquired cards with a collector and dealer who was also one of the most trusted individuals on the northern postcard circuit. One or two real gems in a pile of two hundred or so north eastern topographical cards were present before I visited the loo, and missing when I checked two or three hours later. At that time, my ‘friend’ was the last person I suspected until, a few weeks later another dealer warned, ‘Watch out for XY ... we suspect he’s not as honest as he once appeared to be!”

• Keep secrets secret. When I revealed a hidden source of inexpensive postcards in a Durham City antique shop it wasn’t long before the hoard was bought in bulk by someone I once called ‘Friend’.

• Photograph valuable items to make detection easier if items are stolen or lost.

• Herewith: A warning designed to protect you and your stock against life’s more unfortunate individuals, thieves and burglars. BUT PLEASE NOTE WELL - danger is avoidable and, even better, having spent many years dealing at fairs and other outside venues, the author has NEVER encountered danger of any sort! Do not be alarmed! But! Avoid inviting prospects to your home to inspect goods, except sometimes in daylight when others are present. Try not to travel alone to fairs and flea markets where goods can be stolen as you move between stall and vehicle at unloading and reloading times, or when you are distracted or pre-occupied during the day. Worse still, I know several colleagues who were followed home from a fair, not just on darker evenings, who have been intercepted and robbed on route or burgled and assaulted later in their own homes. Moral: Try not to travel alone or unload your vehicle late at night. Flood lights are a good idea for anyone living in isolated areas. Have a burglar alarm installed in your home or business premises, and a safe for smaller, more valuable items.

Legal Aspects

• Stay within the law or risk fines, imprisonment or a possible end to your business for passing off modern goods as antique, intentionally mis-describing goods, trading in stolen items. ‘Ignorance of the law’ is no excuse. In most cases stolen items can be reclaimed by their real owners, while Trading Standards has wide-ranging powers to confiscate or withdraw ‘iffy’ items from sale.

Help from Other People

• Make friends with fellow dealers at car boot sales and flea markets, whether they are selling similar things, or not. Direct competition is not always a bad thing, especially if one party travels more extensively than another, or targets a slightly different audience. For example, I specialised in north eastern topographical cards. Nationwide fairs, supported by dealers all over Britain, comprise some following the entire circuit, and others attending local events only. I chose the latter course and was always the first person to whom nationwide traders chose to offload long-standing north eastern topographical cards at high discounts. They were also my best buyers, in bulk, for more distant topographicals - useless to me, priceless to them.

• Start a ‘swipe’ file of other firms’ advertisements, listings, catalogues, for products you are selling, especially in the early days when you stand to gain well from their experience in selecting, describing and pricing stock. Follow trends. Say, for example, you plan to sell advertising memorabilia gather information on all competing firms selling similar products. Notice what products seem to sell fastest (namely those which never appear a second time, discounting duplicates), study price trends, descriptions, and so on. Information can be gathered by contacting firms from advertisements in general and specialist collectors’ magazines, by asking to be placed on the firm’s mailing list for future offers, by careful study at fairs or other selling venue.

• Join a club or society for your chosen collectors’ theme or themes. Members share valuable information and advice and can be your best customers. Plus you get the chance to build a valuable mailing list for free.

Presentation

• Don’t price directly and indelibly onto delicate items. For example, write in ink on a postcard or book, or append a price label and value drops drastically. If indeed anybody wants it once you have mutilated a previously priceless item! Sticky labels damage most delicate items, including china. Where possible cover the item in see-through plastic - stamp mounts, postcard covers - and stick the label on top. For china and ornamental items, use a price tag fixed with string.

• Keep items as close to original state as possible. For example, leave toys in boxes, book with dustcovers, sets of postcards in original envelopes. Virtually any collectible is worth more complete.

• Repair what you can without spoiling the item or reducing its value. Paintings can be cleaned and restored - only by experts, French polishing improves appearance and value of furniture (only when carried out by professionals).

• Think whether something can be done to an item to increase perceived value and price and interest a wider audience? Prints from early magazines can be removed, cleaned, coloured and framed, for example, early paper collectibles can be packed in sets or bundled like-with-like. Stamps are a good example of items often worth little on their own, but sorted into themes, say space travel, Disney, Elvis Presley, bagged and priced low - they’ll sell like hot cakes at collectors’ fairs, or even through newsagents and toy shops

Pricing

• There is no such thing as the ‘right price’. No-one knows how much an item is really worth, even at auction. Price is what someone is prepared to pay at any point in time: at the right auction an item might go for many times its catalogue value, or for a pittance if the auction is poorly advertised or bad weather keeps bidders away!

• Deciding how much to pay is a major problem for beginners and old hands alike. Obvious good buys - huge catalogue value, pittance of a price tag - should be bagged while the going’s good. If you’re not sure, either take a chance on affordable items or keep a catalogue close by. Deciding how much to charge, say at flea markets or auction (you can set a reserve) or through ads., is a relatively easy task. Either have items valued professionally. Get several valuations - or consult your swipe file of prices from other people’s promotions. Alternatively, sell the item via a specialist auction house - with a reserve - and let market forces decide. For less desirable items, aim for a specific percentage mark-up when selling direct to the public, including trading costs and overheads and profit for you.

• Don’t think age is the only indication of value. Consider more recent items, too, say from the 40s, 50s and 60s; fad products such as Rubik’s Cube and Star Wars models, even modern limited edition items, the likes of teddy bears, designer jewellery, dinosaurs (courtesy ‘Jurassic Park’), Disney figurines.

• Look for anniversaries or other events which might inflate the price of goods significantly, sometimes short-term only. For example, Bonzo dog items might have sold for far more a few years ago exactly fifty years after the death of creator George Studdy. The film of the Titanic and media interest in finding and searching the wreck increased interest and prices of items originally sold to commemorate or raise funds for victims’ dependents.