PNTC Annual Flea Market

6/8/05, 7:34 PM #1

dave caudill
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PNTC Annual Flea Market

dave caudill

>This weekend the Pacific Northwest Tool Collectors had our annual flea market in Oregon. It took place as usual at the club's Presidents house in a nice country setting. I got there the night before and set up my tent and then for the first time ever set up to sell. It was a lot of fun and you never know whats going to show up. Since it is a flea market the rules for sales and what you can sell loosens up quite a bit.

I've been on a downsizing kick lately as I am tired of tripping over all of the stuff to get to what I really want so I'm liquidating some tools. I also took some maple burl I had cut and all of it sold pretty quickly. Sold my set of Marples Blue Chip chisels as well. Time for someone else to sharpen them.

Had lots of fun and got rid of a bit of stuff. Not as much as I'd hoped though. Took a 137 pound anvil and was really hoping not to have to take it home but to no avail. Did sell a couple saws and now only 30 or 40 more to go. One thing

I had no luck with were chisels that I had rehandled, flattened, and sharpened. All of them P.S.& W. or Witherby. They were at $25-$35 apiece and not a bite. You could shave with them and all new boxwood or apple handles. Of course the Stanley planes are always slow. Seems everyone has what they need. On the other hand presharpened saws were of more interest as I suppose folks don't know how to sharpen those and don't know where to have it done. One thing I did find is it is tough pulling the tools out of your collection that you can live without. I'm getting better. The hardest though is to give up my "extra" backsaws. Once gone though it wasn't too bad. I'm not in need of counseling yet.

I did find too that you have to take a lot of stuff you can't seel just to fill up a table and make it interesting and draw people in. All in all a lot of fun.

Dave

Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

6/8/05, 11:05 PM #2

Moses Yoder in White Pigeon, MI
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Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

Moses Yoder in White Pigeon, MI

>I've thought about cleaning up and sharpening old tools and selling them for a profit. Took me about 10 minutes I guess to realize how much work that would be for less than minimum pay. You can buy a brand new L-N chisel for $50, so I can't see anyone spending $15 or more for an old one that is not part of a matching set. I always prefer to sharpen my own chisels the way I want them, and can easily make a handle. But I would agree that having a sale table at a tool meet or flea market would be a blast just to meet tool people.

Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

6/9/05, 12:58 AM #3

Mike L in Trabuco Canyon, CA
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Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

Mike L in Trabuco Canyon, CA

>I agree with Moses. $25-35 chisels are going to be a pretty hard sale; especially for rehandled ones (even if the new handles are every bit as nice as the originals). That's not saying that ready-to-go P.S.&W. and Witherbys aren't worth that much; it's just that most people aren't willing to pay that much.

Quality chisels with original handles seem to go for $10-15 at old tool swap meets around here from tool dealers with fairly large inventories to choose from (excluding highly-desirable types like Stanley Everlasting). Even at those prices, chisels aren't exactly flying off the tables. Once you get down to $5 and less, people seem to get a lot more interested; even if the $5 chisel will require a lot of work before it's useable.

Just my observations.

Regards,

Mike

Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

6/10/05, 8:57 AM #4

Todd Hughes
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Re: PNTC Annual Flea Market

Todd Hughes

>I have sold on Ebay many many chisels for over $50, many for over $100 and more then a couple for over $200. Of all the tools I sell I think I like selling chisels the most,[and saws the least!]. Easy and fast to clean up, even with ones with bad handles usually not much of a trouble because I have a box of handles from rough donor chisels I pick up on the cheap. They're easy to describe and ship too. Around here you can still pick up many chisels for $10 or less so your profit margin is pretty high. Even with chisels that sell for less on ebay if you can get them in groups for not much at auction like I often do you can still do very well with them too since you don't have much time invested.I have put the clock on me and figure it takes me about 15 min. to sell something like this on ebay including packaging etc.....While it might be "fun" to set up at the flea market if you are interested in selling your chisels for the most you can get you are much better off to sell them on the Ebay I think ....Todd

PNTC Annual Flea Market

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