who told them?

[themadhippy]

spent this morning visiting a few charity shops to see if there was any intresting vynal at bargin prices,some hope.my usual "dealer" has increased from the 50p each 3 for a quid to each lp being indivdualy priced,even those top of the pops comps have a £2.99 price tag:confused: ,a boxed set of classical stuff id picked up for £2 brand new in the same shop is now priced at £24.99.i was tempted by a camplewick green lp but at £3 for a very scratched copy, no way!
so whos been spilling the beans and told the old dears who run these places the true value of there stock? looks like i'll have to find a new dealer

[mick parry]

Mr Hippy

These shops are usually charity shops and by definition donate their profits to charity. Oxfam and hospices etc.

Donate your £3.00 and feel good about it.

You still got cheap music and they help to do some good.

Regards

Mick

[SCIDB]

Hi Les,

This sort of thing is becoming very common around the country in the many charity shops. A number have seen that more money can be made on certain records. Shops have noticed people hunting the record bins and have acted.

One Charity shop I visit has a helper who is into vinyl. He has set up a huge rack of stuff mostly in good to mint condition. The stuff sells for 50p upwards, with rarer/collectable stuff going for more. I have seen stuff in here go for more than £10. But the if you went to a collectors shop the same items may cost more. Judging by the people buying stuff, they're are onto a winner.

I have a friend who is a manager with Oxfam & she has told me that they get the Record Collector guide out when they get vinyl in. Just in case it's worth something.

I noticed in a Cash Convertor a copy of the Race by Yello going for a double figure sum. But I have picked up stuff for pence even now. It's just not as easy as before.


SCIDB

[themadhippy]

its the sudden increase in the price that suprised me,i dont mind paying £3(or even £30) for an lp if its something im after but £2.99 for a totp scratched unoriganal artist compalation ?,in the past i would often buy stuff regardless of the quality just becuse it looked intresting

[RDD]

It is getting a bit daft I must say. My local Oxfam in Bury is more like a record collectors store than a charity shop; they even have some of them hanging in the window like some kind of prize or war :( When you go in they have about four shelves with the vinyl segregated into genre!! Gone, it would seem, are the days of just having a cardboard box on the floor. I recently found a Simon & Garfunkle (SP?) single - Bridge Over Troubled Water. Someone had written "Collectors £10" on it, maybe in good condition but the picture sleeve was a ripped mess so no way. Either way as much as you don't think they are checking I'm really starting to think that the bargains are gone from these shops.

It also depends what you are buying them for, if you are just concerned about the prices they are going up to (Hippy) then I agree. If you are a collector after rarities, well I suppose you could be having a hard time of it now.

I'm not sure about the moral stuff really but to my mind they are getting this stuff for free, so to start charging loads of cash for them is to me not right. To think of it another way, what if those people who are giving them these records (as a clear out from their recently departed family members house etc) started doing what they are doing and checking the Record Collectors Guide 2003. Then they wouldn't be able to make these big profits on vinyl as the owners would put it on EPay or sell to a collector. I'm a bit confused about the whole thing of late.

Cheers,
Rick

[TonyL]

I have a friend who is a manager with Oxfam & she has told me that they get the Record Collector guide out when they get vinyl in. Just in case it's worth something.

I find most Oxfam shops hysterical – some of the people doing the pricing don’t appear to have the knowledge required to read the RCRRPG and actually understand it. I do a lot of charity shops regularly, and the amount of say ‘mad hatter’ Charisma label Genesis albums they have confused with the collectable ‘pink scroll’ label is ridiculous – in other words they stick a record that is worth less than £2 up at £10-20! I’ve seen this error at 4 or 5 different Oxfams! Same goes with Sabbath and Vertigo vs. Nems labels and their Beatles pricing can be absurdly ill informed etc.

I have no issue with them charging an appropriate price, but there is no excuse to get it wrong so often. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I do really well at liberating vinyl from charity shops so I can’t complain, but it annoys me that they might be ripping people off who don’t have enough knowledge to pick them up on their errors.

Tony.

[mick parry]

Chaps

These shops are there to raise money for deserving causes.

In my area, we have a local hospice which has literally a few days operating money in the bank. The shops are not going to raise much cash if they only charge about 10p for a record, even if it was donated for free.

No one is forced to buy, so it is all down to market forces. At the end of the day, it will level out.

These shops are there to raise money for charities.

Regards

Mick

[lAmBoY]

Gee Mick, thats a nice horse youve got.

The recipients worth isnt in question. It looks like (through ill informed judgement) they are pricing themselves out of a market - doing more harm than good.

[GrahamN]

Looking at this from the outside, Mick P has a pretty fair point. If they can sell the stuff at those prices, then all power to them - no-one's forcing you to buy it. If they are getting it wrong though, and losing sales due to ignorance, those of you who know about these things could do them a service and tell them a) why you're not buying at that price and b) what the fair price is. I guess, if you've really got the moral point, then you should do the same when you see a collector's item priced at 10p :).

Of course I knew you do that anyway!

[lAmBoY]

Good point.

<jumps on his own high horse>
Of course I always give to charity anyway.
<jumps off horse>

This begs the question: What is the best 'deal' anyone has made from a charity shop?

[cookiemonster]

What is the best 'deal' anyone has made from a charity shop?

Well not quite a charity shop....but an auction raising money for a charity:

To cut it short - Grammophone magazines donated by a dead person via a living one - pristine condition - 1968 -2002 complete - plus a good selection from 1935-1968.
(i need to fill the gaps BTW if anyone reads this and can help)

How much.............................50P...that's how much!!!


......but then i suddenly had a cloud of guilt drift over the horizon and hover like large concrete barge over my head, blocking the rays from the bright star of jubilation...and prodding me in the arse with a pitchfork.....

.....hence i gave them a £20 donation.....

...jobs a good un' - temporary cloud of conscience lifted and bargain deal on some top mags.


:MILD: :MILD:

[sideshowbob]

I got a mint copy of Cheap Trick's Live at the Budokan (the nice yellow vinyl version) for about 50p a few months ago, from a charity shop around the corner from me. That was a pretty good deal, I thought. For nostalgia purposes only, you understand...

-- Ian

[julian2002]

mick,
i think the main problem is charity shops asking premium collector prices for scratched or damaged items. at 50p a record no one expects perfect vinyl or packaging however at the going RCRRPG price you would. also specialist shops where you would pay this much would clean the record before sale whereas i doubt a chrity shop would...
in all though as you point out it is the charity shops and the good causes they fund that will suffer from this policy. if the shops were charging realistic prices mad hippy would have spent a few quid rather than nothing. i ask which is better?
cheers

julian

[cookiemonster]

there is a further twist to this tale of opportunism. i have 5 mins to kill, so will bore you with it...

all the other potential buyers where obviously on the beach that day. They expexted the auction to fetch a reasonable amount £50+ and felt no need for a reserve:eek: . So i wins the auction for the ridiculous 50p, and ONLY then learnt that it was a donation by a recently deceased chap to a museum charity to raise money. Bugger - i didn't want to know that. The lady running the auction was very nice - did not expect anything else (whilst disappointed), but i offered the 20 squids anyway - to which she was absolutely delighted at my generosity:MILD: .So what happens next...

....i had to travel to Kent to pick them up at the museum shop due to the enormous bulk (30+ carrier bags full) anyway. So she decides to plan me a day of entertainment to makle the trip more worthwhile. Gets there - 3 people help load the car - then i get a VIP tour of the museum pro gratis for about an hour - i get given an old book of sheet music as a gift. Then i get invited to this ladys house for lunch. Meets her family - nice folk - have some fodder - cup of tea - chat about stuff - shows me Yehudi Menhuins old tuner that she has - old family friend - blah di blah - and i makes my way home in the afternoon

so all in all - a veritable bargain, for £20.50 and a slurp of petrol.


i'll stop boring you now - can you beat that charity scoop though?:cool:

cheers

[TonyL]

This begs the question: What is the best 'deal' anyone has made from a charity shop?

I’ve hoovered up so many (but I put the time in!)… here are a few good ones over the last year or so:

Scott Walker ‘Scott 2’ EX/EX 50p (£20 value).
Jackson Heights ‘King Progress’ (pink scroll Charisma) EX/EX 50p (£25).
Yes, ‘The Yes Album’ (red plum label) EX/NM £1.50 (made £35 on Ebay). I’ve got another VG/EX copy in my ‘to list’ pile.
Genesis ‘Nursery Crime’ (pink scroll Charisma) EX/NM £2 (made £62 on Ebay!!).
Beatles ‘Revolver’ (1966 2nd pressing) EX/EX £10 (made £36 on Ebay).
A few wide band Decca SXLs – average buy 50p / sell £10.

Tony.

A man who loves charity shops!