Totally OT and lame...don't read! Re: Rare Apples, eBay, Goodwill

[Vintage Computer Festival]

On Thu, 24 Mar 2005, Chad Fernandez wrote:

>   The product is free, the cost is lights, heat, ac, labor, trash
> disposal, etc.  They're all pretty much fixed, unless donations
> skyrocket.  Labor may change a bit, if the outgoing product is changed
> from trash to sales.

Sales are not free.  There's a cost of doing business.  You really need to
read a book on business principles or take a local community college
course on it.  Better yet, start your own business to learn first hand.

> > So using a price guide to identify specific computers that already has a
> > suggested price range to choose from is too complicated, but sending out a
> > "summary sheet" to all the stores that asks the same employees you just
> > finished saying aren't capable of utilizing a price guide to apply totally
> > subjective rules to select and price computers is not?
>
> I don't believe the  majority of Goodwill employees have the interest,
> knowledge, patience, or time to go looking in a book for every computer
> that goes through Goodwill, only to find out that it's only worth $10,
> or it's not in the book, or to have it priced at $150, but only worth
> $15 because they mis-identify it, and they have to get a rack of jeans
> out on the sales floor.

First of all, have you ever seen Michael Nadeau's book?  It's not, you
should buy a copy (as should anyone at all interested in collecting
vintage computers).  It's pretty comprehensive.

Second, if you really think it's quicker and more efficient for them to
read and interpret a sheet of "guidelines" that will be obsolete and
require re-publication and re-distribution every few months then you have
never managed people before.

> A sheet of guide lines can tell them, the
> monitors a small one, it's clean, and it says Trinitron, $15... bam
> they're done, next item.  Let's see, it says Mac, the screen is part of
> it, it's pretty dirty, $10, bam done, next item.

Does it work?  Do they know?  Do they know how to test it?  Did they test
it 100%?  Are all the colors present?  Is there any distortion or is any
part of the screen out of focus?  What kind of dot pitch does it have?
What's its maximum resolution?  Did they test all the video modes for
that monitor?  Does it require degaussing?  Did they burn it in for 24
hours to catch problems that only manifest themselves after continuous
operation?  Is all this worth $10 to $15?

If it doesn't work, then what?  Pay $10 to $15 to get rid of it?  That's
the current going rate in much of the US.

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
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