Will swap meets grow this year???

Just wondering what everyone thinks about swap meets this year? With how bad the economy is and people trying to save money, will the swap meets grow in size opposed to years past. And will people actually try to trade parts insted of selling? Is the swap meet going to make a little comeback????

 

I would say yes, they will make a comeback.

 

there will be a lot of sellers and even more tire kickers.from my experience of chasing the meets.

 

one thing I noticed late this year is peple would take my card, and would say they would be back later to buy at my business, after the meet, none showed, they used too so was a lack of money after food, heat ,and basic needs

another thing that was noticible was some just wanted to beat good cheep prices in 1/2

and the the others just jumped on some stuff and paid it and i thought some of that was slightly overpriced

after having a fairly good day i figured the loading labor and gas for haul and swap space rent and it was hardly worth the effort

but it was a great day for visiting

 

I think people are getting lazy with the ease of the internet. You'll see more hoarders unloading and prices maybe dropping a bit as the supply increases.

 

I believe that there will be a LOT MORE lookers and less buyers ... unless you have your good stuff priced at half price or less. I have set up at Spring Charlotte AutoFair since 1977 ... every year.





For the last 15 to 20 years, I have been accross from Modifiedriver and the HAMB village ...
I am on the pavement ... and have 5 spots ...
So I know a little about swap meets. For the last 3 or 4 years, there has been a steady decline in buyers, and a stedy increase in LOOKERS. If you have Camaro/Mustang/ late model stuff ... that is what the folks seem to be interested in. But I do not SEE folks carrying stuff they bought like in the past.

I lease out 4 of my spots now to family and friends ... and just use the AutoFair to see old friends and hang out. There is almost no pre WII stuff there for sale and if you find a 32 original 32 Ford part ... it is either junk/trash or priced so you have to take out a second mortage on your home.

With the economy down ... it believe it will get worse @ the swap meets ...
BUT ... I will be there

 

I hope that they get better.I need alot of parts for my build.

Getting parts at a good deal is the way it was in the old days,It would be nice to see that again some time soon.

Hope fully the hoarders will bring it out for us to scoop up.

 

This explains why I went to 4 swaps this year and bought one part. I always come with money in my pocket and rarely find much that excites me that isn't priced at twice what it's worth. However, I still enjoy the time hanging with family and friends.

 

More sellers, fewer buyers. Simple.

 

well... with ebay sucking I think parts sellers will be heading back to the swaps rather that deal with that piece of shit company.

sold over $100,000.00 worth of stuff on ebay from 2003 til last year when the fucking started. for 2008 I've sold about $2500.00. I'll be doing a few swaps this year and hopefully doing well selling. on the other hand, guys like me who would show up early at EVERY swap I could make it to and spend $200 - $1000.00 at a swap for ebay junk are no longer doing it since the money is no longer there.

it's a crazy world these days so who knows what will happen regarding swaps and the economy.

 

i moved 297 old cars through ebay last year.i have not sold a single car in 2008,at either ebay or a swap meet.got a loit of lookers and no green changing hands.

 

Problems same here in NZ. Trademe (a local version of E-bay, although we can access e-bay here too) has certainly killed off swap meets to a large degree. There is still old stuff popping up but prices are so steep, their vertical!! Still go to the swap meets tho, good for catching up with people, more of a social event. I don't think we have been hit by the economic crisis fully....yet.

 

I am only 24 and have only been building my car for 1yr so i have not been around swap meets that long but when i started looking for a project 2yrs before i noticed there were a ton of vendors and alot of project. Now its hard to find anything that isnt for a SBC or a Mustang thats about it.

I am hoping that people will start to bring parts out to trade or even sell but not at "vertical" prices haha.

I have a ton of parts i dont need for my build but i need a ton of other parts. I dont care if i trade up or down as long as i get my part at a fair trade for both sides. Maybe thats just me...

 

I'm hoping (but not holding my breath) that a lot of the Taiwan tool dealers and Nascar collectable toy dealers and guys selling sunglasses will hang it up and make room at Iola for people with actual car parts to sell. We'll see if that happens.

And kinda off the topic, but I'm the kind of guy who'll offer half the asking price on something if I want it and I'm willing to pay half. A lot of people say no, and that's OK by me, but I figure I should offer it anyway, a lot of times I get it for what I offer or close to it. I know when I'm selling shit, I'm there to sell, not to show off my collection of garbage, so I want to hear offers, whether or not I'm going to accept it.

 

I found that swap meet selling is a psychology. Some guys offer half, or just less than, what you have on it because they want to get a deal. So I started marking stuff twice what I wanted for it. If I had say a model car kit marked $10 they wanted to give me $8 for (even though it had been out of production for 10 years and even the big model cars only guy didn't have any), I said no, then marked it $12 or $14 after the guy left. That way the guy who wants a deal can get a deal - and if someone wants to pay the marked price, so much the better for me.

So if you see stuff marked more than you want to pay, you shouldn't be afraid to offer less. Worst that happens is the guy says no. Like he said, I brought it there to sell, not to show off - but if it's not total crap, I don't want to give it away, either.


My experience last year was as long as gas prices were up, it was just dead. I did two or three new shows and did good, but had no past experience to compare to. A couple shows I barely broke even with - but in the fall it picked up a bit. The train shows I do in the winter have been up and down so far - one I sold more than last year, the new one I did, I could have packed up and stayed home for all I sold on the second day.

I tend to think the people out spending money will be looking to save a buck, and the stuff you can sell cheap will do okay. Bigger ticket stuff will see more people buying only if they need it. And that will only last as long as our money is any good - with all these loans and bailouts and interest rate cuts, plus them printing money left and right, currency isn't that stable right now. If something happens to cause all that money to start circulating, you'll have to mark your prices up so that guys need a wheelbarrow of cash just to buy those formerly $2 each hubcaps, so you can take the same wheelbarrow load over to the store and buy a loaf of bread.

 

I hope the greedy clowns at E-bay go completely broke though they probably won't. I'm as guilty as most of enjoying the ease of selling on E-bay. They/we ruined the swap meet scene that my wife and I enjoyed for years. Swap meets were like a treasure hunt and I would generally have a want list as well as just treasure hunting. Swap meets also gave us an excuse to go out of town for a day or two and occasionally we even came home with more money than we left with. I'm already boxing stuff for the up and coming swap meet season and I'll be selling at what I think is a fair price rather than letting world wide demand set the price.

 

There was more of everything at Hershey this year...everything except buyers. Prices were decent and fair but noticed more window shoppers. I think it's a good thing to keep swap meets going. Push it yourselves. Tell your friends. Create some excitement. You'd be surprised how far some contagious enthusiasm will go.

 

My local swapmeets seemed larger then last year, but there was a lot more late model stuff for mustangs and the like. A lot of the older stuff had high prices for what it really was worth. I did pick up some good deals and found stuff that I was looking for for descent prices. Last swapmeet I went to was the Baytown Dragstrip and there were a fraction of sellers that were normally there, but we had the hurricane come through the week before which was a big factor.

If they stay the same size as this year that would be great, just with better quality stuff.

 

I really, really hope so...

 

We had lots of buyers this year for the hot rod estate sale stuff at the Monroe swap meet, but that was selling on price alone. Many of the buyers were either dealers or other long time shoppers that know what a good deal was. I always think that cars and parts will get cheaper as the economy turns down, but they never seem to-the amount for sale just gets smaller. People don't seem to be willing to sell hard found parts or cars to get operating cash, although some exceptions can be found. Remember that only about half (or less)the older guys that build cars use a computer, so swap meets are still their primary market. Garage sales are the new swap meets for me

 

I agree that eBay's latest policies are really shitty and I hope they get some new competition from somewhere that puts them under. I'd leave them and sell somewhere else if the opportunity arose.

But I also have to say that I could not have done much with some of my cars if not for eBay, the swap meet is fun but I'd have to go for 100 years to find all the stuff I need for some of the cars I'm working on. I owe that to the people who sell on eBay. Not to the company.

I go to swap meets to buy, and I usually find plenty. But the few times I've tried to sell I haven't done well. It ends up a wash money wise by the time I pay for a spot and make the trip and do all the other related bullshit.

If I'm going to spend $300 over the course of a weekend to sell $300 worth of shit, I may as well just take half the stuff I want to sell, throw it in a dumpster, and stay home to work on something.

 

what i have found is that larger swap meets are not as good as the smaller local ones..
I have sold more at a 150 vendor show than I have at a 1,000 vendor show.
and yes, everyone is more picky about what they buy..

Used to be able to sell damn near anything..Not so anymore.

1939fiat

 

I'm totally biased, because I promote a monthly swap meet.
This year, my shows were way down... Some of it was competition from other shows, a lot of it was horrid gas prices.

I like to think that Ebay fees are going to drive a lot of sellers away. I also like to think that people are going to want money, and will clean out their garage at the swap meet.

One of the things I like most about my show, though, is that a lot of local guys come out just to hang with their friends. It's become a social event for a lot of my regular customers, and I absolutely LOVE that! I keep the prices really low, and I'm actually going to drop the vendor prices this year, but that's not due to the economy... We planned that way before the crunch.

I'd like to also think that with ebay doing less and less for parts hounds, the global economy isn't going to screw as much with prices.

Two interesting stories from my show this year: I had a friend set up, so I put a bunch of my stuff with him...stuff I'd been hauling there for 5 years, and always hauled home. Without changing a single price, I sold almost $120 worth of nickel-and-dime small stuff. All at once, everyone wanted the stuff that'd been passed over for 5 years. It's peanuts, but I found it interesting.

Another guy had a huge load of currently-tagged fire extinguishers that his factory was getting rid of. They change them out every two years as a matter of policy. The first weekend he came, they sold like hot cakes. In subsequent months, they weren't selling. Another vendor told him to put them out two at a time, rather than the whole case. Supply, Demand and Rarity took over the market...He sold them almost as fast as he could replace them with the stash in the back of the truck.

-Brad

 

My semi-professional swap meet dealer buddies have all but quit setting up. They are only doing very select shows. Gas prices were a big part of it, but even short of that, they were not selling much. It is the lower priced items that are their bread and butter. They sell in volume. However, it is the low priced stuff that quit selling. They are still selling the big ticket items, and don't have to leave their house to make the sale on those items.

I've personally quit setting up at any swap meets. Last show that I did was in July. Broke even. Not worth it.

I had planned to set up (or at least go to shop) at some of Brad's swaps, but the price of gas put an end to that thought. It would have cost me about $100 in gas just to get there and back. Now that the gas prices are down (if they stay down) I'll be going to some of Brad's swapmeets when the weather warms up some.

 

I sure miss the swap meets before ebay . pomona, rose bowl, the old pate !
I go to all the ones around here but I don`t think I have seen any thing I have wanted to buy in years that you can`t buy new online for the same price
it`s all the same people with the same crap , that nobody wants ?
I still go but it`s more of a road trip to see friends and look at crap I`m glad I don`t have to haul around .
swap meets are only going to get better if people have to sell there prize collections to keep there heads above water, and I hope that doesn't happen.

craigslist is where it`s at nowadays

 

spend your cash, i say get rid of it its just paper, people will give you awesome stuff and food for paper, i dont get it

 

Get one dollar from each "BE BACK" and you'll go home RiCH !

 

I still find good ones,,it really depends on where.. Big ones like Englishtown will be like they use to.

 

a key element of a swap meet is

• it's real ...

• it's real people

• real parts that you can touch and see ..


the old traditional swap meet will continue ...
maybe even grow ...

as people want to be face to face ....
as opposed behind a screen with a mouse ..

I would guess that a huge percentage of the sellers barely break even
after the cost of the space and effort of dragging the parts to the meet
but oh the stories .. they are priceless

Just cruise thru any old time swap meet .... tune in ...
People are having fun .. and exchanging ideas and solutions
if you want to make a dollar get a job at McDonalds

I've been going to meets since 1965 ...
sold and bought a bunch of parts and cars
have also run quite few and watched them grow..
and many have become a "commercial run" nightmare
thru necessity to cover uncontrolled overhead (site rentals ,city permits, sales tax etc)
and sadly have lost the traditional flavor from where they grew ... ...

the small swap meets sponsored by clubs are disappearing as the clubs "age out" and the overhead and labor eats them alive

I suggest everyone go and support all the swap meets they can especially the small club run ones .... save a tradition that fuels this insane hobby .. and please don't say a swap meet was no good because it didn't have the parts or cars that you were looking for .. be positive .. get positive results

"In Rust We Trust"

John

 

I think some of the sellers will still try and rape ya but the 'originals' will still trade and offer good deals,but i think the prices will have to be lower than the last few years (its a local swap meet not frickin Barrett Jackson)
Meeting with real people is the real draw for me
Bob