[Milsurplus] Golden years of collecting?

[Michael Bittner]

Right on, Ray and also the comments of Nick K4MYW.  You have both summarized 
what a great venue eBay is for getting this old gear into the hands of 
people who appreciate it instead of it winding up in the dump.

As an occasional seller and a more frequent buyer on eBay, these are my 
comments:

1. PayPal doesn't cost a dime to the buyer, and it's a great motivator for 
the potential buyer to commit to a purchase.  All it takes is a click of a 
mouse button and the deed is done.  No checks to write, no postage cost, no 
trips to the bank or post office for a money order.

2. As a seller, I am not interested in squeezing every last dime out of 
every sale.  My objectives are to get the stuff into the hands of people who 
are looking for it, and let the free market determine what the price is.

3. If a buyer requests payment by Money Order, I always say OK.  When the MO 
comes in the mail, I ship the item and mark it as "Payment Received" and as 
"Shipped" in my PayPal account.  No reminders to pay or any other 
repercussions happen.  That's the end of it.

4. On big ticket items, I'm happy for an MO as it saves the big chunk of 
money that PayPal would take out if the buyer paid by PayPal.  On small 
ticket items, the money that PayPal would take out doesn't amount to the 
cost of gas for me to drive to the bank to cash the MO.  But I'll take the 
MO anyway.

5. Small packages, under 13 ounces, can be sent from the Post Office by 1st 
Class Mail.  It's cheap, fast and the best deal for both the buyer and the 
seller.  Even Parcel Post is a relatively good deal for bigger items, but it 
just takes longer.  Unless you need it yesterday, forget about Express Mail 
or Priority Mail.  They are not worth the extra cost which can be 
considerable.  Many sellers only list Priority Mail.  Either request them to 
ship cheaper or don't bid on their items.  On really heavy items, such as an 
SCR-284, I use UPS and let them professionally pack it.

6. I could write a small book on doofuss sellers who can't even put a 
coherent sentence together in their eBay ads, give you one line of 
description and 35 lines of terms and conditions, never use spell check, 
have no clue what they are selling, have hopelessly high start prices on 
their items, and on and on, but that's for another time.

73, Mike W6MAB




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ray Fantini" <RAFANTINI at salisbury.edu>
To: <milsurplus at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 8:37 AM
Subject: [Milsurplus] Golden years of collecting?


> The prices are always better and there is never any shipping cost at a 
> Hamfest. I have been going to fests for around thirty to thirty five years 
> now and have seen many changes and every year hear the same lament; it was 
> bigger last year and will be gone soon. Back in the eighties and early 
> nineties everyone was convinced that it was all going to be computers and 
> hamfest as we know them are finished, but as long as fest like Timonium 
> and Dayton are there I will be too. EBay has provided me many items I 
> would never have found on my own. The last couple months I have been 
> buying antique computer hardware and can think of no other source, wonder 
> what ever happened to the Trenton Computer Fest? The internet, web pages 
> and email reflectors and maybe companies like EBay have only improved 
> hobbies and collecting and have to wonder when was this golden age of 
> military radio collecting and when were things so much better then now? 
> Maybe in the late forties and early fifties there was
> a lot of surplus around but the armature community in general only wanted 
> to hack that stuff and forgot about it as soon as store bought equipment 
> became cheap and plentiful.
> Ray Fantini KA3EKH
>
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