"No Bring & Buy at Derby" Topic

Just visited Derby Wargames Show website and they're is no Bring & Buy this year. Damn.

That seems to be an increasing trend at UK shows.

It was 50% junk, 49% overpriced and 1% "actual stuff a human would buy" anyway. In any case its almost always nearly impossible to get through to it due to backpacks and bellys

Oh no! How else will I be able to get rid of my mountains of primed but otherwise unpainted Games Workshop stuff?

It was awful last year………….

I do worry about bring and buy dropping off the circuit, as without it, how do I pick up the bargains.

as without it, how do I pick up the bargains.

dare I suggest eBay?

We switched to a tabletop sale at our Battleground show, which is a lot easier to run from an organiser perspective.

Bring & Buy's require a lot of manpower to run properly and will always have security worries, whereas the tabletop sale can be run by 1 or 2 people just to check people in and assign them a slot/table.

People pay a set fee per half-hour/hour and get a table to sell their own stuff. They can deal with the customer direct, haggle over prices where necessary, and walk away after their hour with the cash in hand ready to go spend in the show!

Tabletop sales have to be the way to go

Ditto on Table Top Sales, called "Flea Market" in the US. 1/2 hour per time slot is pretty short. Players are busy with games may not be free to align with sellers. A couple of people could share a table in successive slots. Or allow a person to buy into multiple slots.

No back packs allowed in the sale are :)

There are a growing number of wargames boot sales, table sales really. There have been several in the Manchester area, some I think near Stafford and some on the South West.

For the uninitiated what are bring & buys then?
I thought flea market/table sale was the same thing as bring & buy but interested to hear the difference.

A Bring & Buy is similar to a flea market but sellers bring items they wish to sell and hand them over to the team that run the B&B. This normally involved some paperwork and then the item is placed along with many many other items on a dirty great table that people are free to browse.

It is rather like a community table at a table sale if that means anything to you.

…and the team selling the items take a % cut of the sale price.

….. and allegedly sometimes get first dibs on the goods too.

I did the tabletop slot system at the Hammerhead Show and I can't see why anyone would even think a bring and buy was a good idea.

Here's your table, you've 30 minutes/1 hour.

Not much work for the organisers and a fair chance for anyone buying.

I made quite a bit of money and spent most of it with the traders at the show.

Our local gaming group has been toying with the idea of having a Flea Market only with no games at all. We are fortunate to have a location that allows us to add more events to the yearly schedule. It might be a good draw for local gamers and clubs to unload some old stuff and find a few bargins as well. I've been to miniatures conventions and seen my friends walk by with an armload of goodies and tell me I just missed some great deals. If we had a day that was all about the phyisical bits of the hobby such as troops, terrain and books I think it would be well-attended.
Well I am planning on trying it next summer so watch this space for an AAR.

There it a tabletop sale in Stockport on the 11th of October. I intend taking a table and trying to offload some of my surplus stuff.

Thanks, jhh. Sounds like a consignment sale of sorts.

Bring and buys are never nice. The organisers and trade get first grab at any bargains. In fact I ve seen traders stalking the check-in queue at shows to head off the bargains. Add in items that mysteriously disappear without trace or payment, and as far as I am concerned that zoo can disappear for good.

Table hire is the way to go.

I've rarely bought anything from b&bs but have sold alot. Overall I've found them more profitable and less hassle than ebay.

I am also a big fan of tabletop sales. Bring&buy is a good idea of you have a small local show or an extended club meeting with maybe 100 people max, but doesn't scale at for bigger shows.

Also, the spirit of a B&B originally was much more to sell off / give away your excess stuff to a fellow gamer, and get some small cash in return. But at one point, some guys saw the B&Bs as a way to actually make money. The result was very often huge amounts of junk at ridiculous high prices. And since you didn't have to put in time or effort yourself, anything went.

Tabletop sales are a much better model. Once you realize you actually have to spend your own time selling your junk, people become more sensible about what to offer, and at what price.

Colours last year finally put me off Bring & Buy. Despite having aquired an annex they still held it on the third floor !!! Then two & a quarter hours to book stuff in, during which time one of the three members of the host club 'guarding' the model display, said, 'IF (IF !!!!!)there was a problem'(he)'would help out' & 45 minutes at the end for them to find what had not been sold.
My (so far) one & only taste of Table Top Sales is MUCH more favourable. Hammerhead did it & in my opinion did it well. I could make deals, lump items together into bundles & as my slot drew to a close I could reduce prices.
M&M Wargames are organising a Table Top sale 02.11.14 at 202 Field Hospital Army Reserve Centre
Waterloo Rd. Cobridge. Stoke on Trent. Staffs. ST6 3HJ
e-mail Jonathan on 'trasimene-1@yahoo.co.uk' OR
phone Paul on 07970 003964

Lincombe Barn Tabletop sale in Downend, Bristol is great. A group of us often share a table so you even get to leave your mate in charge and browse… Of course you take the risk he sells your stuff for a pittance ;-)

I've been stalked in the queue at B&Bs by traders looking for stuff, and in fact I sold some SYW items which then, surprise surprise, appeared on eBay a week later. A colleague has also had stuff lifted at Derby when it was held in that stuffy room in the Uni. I too thought that the B&B at Derby was pretty poor two years ago, and last year positively dire. I think there were only two decent looking items on there. Tabletop sales are the future. Oh, and my colleague also had the organisers buying his stuff as he was booking it in at Derby two years ago, so yes they do get first dibs, mind you he wasn't complaining as he took it to sell, money is money at the end of the day.

Any more info regarding the sale in Stockport? I've got a few bits I'd like to shift..

I really don't get these 'book yourself a half an hour' sales – I can see how they are easier to organise but the one at York is dreadful – you'd have to keep shuffling round and round all day if you were just looking for say a few old Airfix kits when with a classic B&B you can just scan it in 5 minutes, see if there is anything you are interested in and go.

I ENJOY picking up a few old ready made kits cheap and then doing them up. More generally I like the randomness of bring and buys when to be frank a lot of the established shows are very predictable as to which traders will be there, etc.

I understand the sale in Stockport has moved to the 12th. I will see if I can get any more information.

Appreciated, thanks.