Flogging off the family silver

[Greybeard]

As mentioned elsewhere I am downsizing stuff. This is in readiness to live in a smaller house. A couple of items are: A collection of International Times youth culture papers that I used to buy when I went into London in the late 1960's to see bands like Pink Floyd, who were a regular Friday night band at a club I frequented. I've hung onto the papers since then in the hope they would become valuable. I put the papers on eBay and got nearly £100 for them.

A bit later, in the 1970's I was employed as a motorcycle dispatch rider for a local printers. The company started to print Ritz, a weekly fashion based newspaper published by famous photographers David Bailey and Patrick Lichfield. I grabbed 15 copies of issues one and two and then when I left the company single copies collected by a friend who was still working there. Again, I've kept the papers until now. I have about 40 issues.
I checked eBay to see if the Ritz papers had much value and got quite a shock, some copies are asking three figure sums! Whether the seller gets that amount is another thing. I put a single first issue on eBay and got £20 for it. At £20 a go I'd be happy. However, I have an unread tied up bundle of fifteen second issues that I bundled as they came off the press. As the papers in the bundle have not even had light on them since 1977 I've listed the bundle at £300 Buy it Now price.
eBay item number is 235424807915

 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/235424807915?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=bF-oPcmpRzG&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=bF-oPcmpRzG&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

[Rex]

Funny how printed matter values go up and down. A year or so back a mate gave me a bound volume of the first 12 issues of Classic Bike from 1978. Used to be be lots of adverts asking for the early ones, presumably to make a full collection, but when I last checked there were several on Ebay for a whole...ten quid, and they weren't selling.
I suppose when PC's became commonplace and Google was invented, the days of spending hours turning pages to find an article and pics were over.

[Joolstacho]

Yes, I've got hundreds of Cl Bikes (From issue#1), Cl Racer, Cl Mechanics Cl Motorcycle, even Motorcycle Sport. Hard won treasures eh? but I'm thinning out everything. Guess I should sell them but......

[berger]

i have piles of CBike  CMechanics and others , also many books like volumes on the history of the great war and other books i haven't looked at for 40+ years , they have to go!  i think the best thing is let them go free and let someone else try and make a shilling or two, otherwise it will be bin time, too much clutter and i need to thin it out. i have things that as a child i was told to look after because they would " be worth a lot one day lad"  it turns out they are not worth the lot after all because millions of children got the same gifts as me

[Worty]

It's amazing what is of value though.

My dad used to run a youth club for a few years in the village where I grew up.  When he died in 2012, I was clearing out the garage for my mum and came across two Jabez Cliff (Walsall) leather footballs which were deflated and a bit crusty (lying around for around 40 years).  I put them on Ebay out of curiosity, and they both sold, one for £120 to a guy in Singapore, and the other for around £65 to a fella in Ireland (I think).  We also had about six Mamods, which also sold extremely well.  I had quite a few matchbox vehicles (some boxed), which sold for around £50.  All in all, it all made around £600 for my mum's old age fund (still with us, 85 this year). 💰

[Rex]

Classic Mechanics (the first two years or so anyway) was a worthwhile buy, then it went all Japan-eezy and featured Z1's, CB400/4's etc and went down the pan rapidly.
They did a three episode engine rebuild of a unit 500 Tr*umph, and it was far more informative than Haynes or even the factory manual.
I suppose the marketing people didn't catch on that so few people would be attempting the home rebuild of a Japanese 4..

[fffcycles]

Yes, having to rid ourselves of these things has become a real chore. I have hundreds (thousands?)of magazines and a very extensive shop/parts manuals collection that will be useful to someone some day but right now I am having difficulties giving them away. One friend has volunteered to assume the manuals but I know his wife well and she will have them boxed up and sent to recycling the moment I am gone. I also have what is possibly the largest privately held parts hoard for British  bikes in Canada or North America; but who has the space or patience to hold on to that?
Frank

[Worty]

I also have what is possibly the largest privately held parts hoard for British  bikes in Canada or North America; but who has the space or patience to hold on to that?

Me, Frank, me

[Rex]

When I was in the VMCC some years ago this was a problem which seemed to arise on a regular basis. The VMCC has an extensive library,  containing factory records, despatch books, engineering drawings etc but also piles of donated tat like CB etc.
The perennial question was what to ditch and what to keep (space was at a premium) and who would do the actual sorting and to what standard?
Old Joe might consider that a period pamphlet of a Bown Autocycle was worth keeping while old Bert might think that no-one was ever going to ask to see that and so chuck it.
The VMCC didn't really want to keep it and would have happily donated the lot to a museum or whatever, but unsurprisingly, no-one else wanted to store it either.

[Worty]

People see value in all sorts of things, but the value to them is not necessarily shared.

I try to go by a very loose rule, if I've not used something in about 5 years (and I can't see a definite future application for it), then I'm looking to get it out the door.  Having said that, I have a sweatshirt that's 40 years old and T-shirts about 30.  I also try to weigh up the cost of buying the thing again should I need it.  Quite often, buying it again is a cheaper, better option than having lots of stuff lying around not being used.

The other thing is that new things come out so quickly that older, decent stuff ends up having no value but takes up space.  Just seems wrong to bin it.

Answer, just try to give stuff away if nobody wants to buy it, and just hope they'll make some good use of it.

[berger]

worty yes i have some 1970's clothing i can't even fit in any more. WHY do i keep it?  i think it's because i see levi's and wranglers and the odd ben sherman or arrington whatever they were called and other sutch stuff selling for silly money. anyway i found these magazines and the 1983 one was about the same time i started to re build betsy after snapping her crank. i think the late one belongs to a member on here. ps  what's happened to sluggo? he was very interesting .

[Worty]

Just dropped Sluggo a quick PM to see how he's doing.