Bartertown.com

I guess this goes in the coffee place.... I am drinking coffee now anyhow.

So tonight I will be getting a large transaction done in person with a local guy that runs/ran a internet biz. He has more stuff than room to put it. So I should get a good deal and ill be looking to trade it off here.

Any tips?

I think he has Ultra Forge models, and I love those plus get asked for them alot, I hope he has the dragon! or 5 of them....

Ill let you know how the whole thing goes. Its an often little known fact, but many retailers will even work with an individual (customer) that has a lot of money (thats the key - money, lots of it) and you can get huge pile of stuff to empower your trading and turn it into more stuff. And this doesn't happen everyday so you may like to hear the stories of it

Ever hear of the guy that turned a paper clip into a new Mercedes? that was on cnn last year. I hope to get some really cool Forge World stuff from btown, and maybe even cash for new magic addiction.

I think ill be pulling in $1750 - 2k worth of stuff, which will be probably $3000+ at retail.
if you think i should look for something or know whats HOT right now (maybe blood angels stuff b/c they have a new release soon?)please let me know. Id appreciate help b/c im about to pull the switch on this one.

but please Dont ask me to "hold stuff if he has it", im just looking for some tips on what to point the money at, but i will let you know what i get, well more specifically what isn't for me and the local friends of mine (they get first dibs...only makes sense.)

getting some pm's from you guys.

couple things. I wont be getting any forgeworld from this guy (i don't think) He has retail stuff that would be in his retail store, and Im pretty sure you cant get a forgeworld retail account or we would all have one.

Also Im not doing this to start up my bitz stock per - say, I might bitz-out some battleforces if i get enough, this is more about capital/inventory management, and my addiction to trading. I think I like to just "do" the transaction... at least i dont get bored.

And this wasn't about me trying to line you guys up for trades, rather just sharing the experience of going to buy a bunch of stuff at once, b/c who the heck ever gets to to this??? Have you? and i thought you'd like to know what it felt like.... while we drink coffee.

now i think a new post has started. What are good things to get to bump up my bitz inventory? Command squads have cool bitz, battleforces for the qty factor and value, obviously - but maybe you know something i never thought of. (see what you started?) JUST WENT AND EDITED THE MAIN TITLE

If you are going to be starting up a new little business. Why don't you can buy directly from Manufacturer or Wholesalers. You get about 45-50% off retail. If you are buying out surplus stock I wouldn't pay more than $.20 to $.30 on the retail dollar. You are doing them a favor it's surplus for a reason. That's why most people ask at least 65% or 35% off retail for their minis here. that is pretty much the best discount out there. 50% retail to the manufacture or wholesaler at a 30% margin, it works out to 65% retail.

Oh yes, we are getting manufacturer accounts. Currently in the decide which of these two cities we want to place the venue, and then get a lease between the many sites we have surveyed. I might be doing this guy a favor, but trust me - I wouldn't waste my time if i didn't know how to come out on top. I didn't get the pile of cash im using by not knowing how to do this. But as to your good advice, Ive already sent in a pm to become a btown advertiser in the meantime. And we will have the accounts and all that stuff by the summer.

But who is doing a good job at offering bitz right now? I see battlewagon bits on the % war % store, but that guy doesn't even mess with btown anymore (haven't seen a banner.)

and $8 for 5 terminator storm bolter arms... my prices will make that seem like a bad joke.
and $9 for the assualt cannon - seriously???? I know I can beat that!
Dont get me wrong, that guy Neal has always seemed like a nice guy, and must know something to have been around this long, but I think its his perspective. He actually might have unknown bad habits that cause a certain business point of view because of what he knows. I dont have that because I dont know anything.... ignorance is bliss.

I do know this. Id never pay $9 for a assualt cannon arm. And Id bet this venture on it when i say "I don't think anybody else wants to either." (at least they'd like to pay less.)

We haven't had a bits retailer as an advertiser in a while and, the last one we had...

Well, we haven't had a *good* bits retailer in a VERY long time. : )

I think some of our current and/or past advertisers have dabbled, but we haven't seen a LOT of it.

Right now, you want to set your sights on Dark Eldar (new models) and Blood Angels the most. Those are the two newest armies, so they're "all the rage."
Space Marines are never a bad bet. So many people play SM or SM-like armies, that most of the stuff in universal.
Orks are currently a very popular army, as well.

Buy every Ultraforge model you can. There are only one or two that aren't *HOT* but, if you get them cheap enough to give a decent discount, they'd probably move, too.

WHFB have New Skaven as the current hotness, as far as I've seen. Can't offer much else on them, though.

You know buying GW items (and UF), or are you going into other lines, too?
Avoic D&D 4e like the plague. It seems like most RPGers are doing that, too.

Hope that helps.

Eric

as far as space marines go - the hot items:
terminator Storm shields
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Space marine Missle Launchers (all flavors)
Space marine Melta guns
Space Marine Plasma guns
Assault Marine Jump packs
Space Marine command squad options (specifically the apothecary bits)
Dreadnought close combat arms - the new Blood angel dread kit in its entirety will be hot.
Razorback turrets (or the ones from the land raider)
Space Marine Legs
Assault Marine Running legs
Studded shoulder pads
beakie helmets

Orks - Lootas/burnas, bikes and plain old ork boy legs will get nice returns. Power klaws too. Ork trukk drivers/gunners do well, as do the wheels. Battlewagon gunners/tracks are hot, as well as the weapons that come with it, but there are lots of pieces that just sit. Killa kans and the new dreads part out well (mostly the arms) to converters.

Dark Eldar will be hot, especially for people converting up the missing FoC items right now.

If priced correctly these items will all sell faster than you can stock them. Don't bother with the black templar or dark angels accessory stuff. That market is saturated and anybody who wants it, has it already. You can probably avoid the space wolves as well, as they are pretty played out.

Wow, good list.

I wasn't sure about a couple things on there - but ill think of them from now on.

I will NOT ever do D&D again, none of it. Maybe as a special order on high discount - but never will stock it, people who want to read books in a store can go to borders.

I might be getting a bunch of privateer press tonight too, and I will get into whatever distributor sells them the cheapest soon. I think its alliance, but I've heard contradicting things about them and where to go for P.P. stuff. gonna look into ACD and others

Here's what we want to get in the first month once all the requirements are met.

-GW
-PP
-WOTC
-Windsor & newton (have it already actually, just need the opening order)
-acryllios - vallejo paints
-reaper
-avatars of war
-armorcast
-army painter paints
-chessex
-ultraforge
-galeforce9
-sabol design
-battle foam, if i can work stuff out with that guy.
-all the board games - might just come from one source, some sell direct to retailers, some dont.
-ultra pro - for magic and what not
-might go video games at some point, if best buy goes out of business......probably will include a buy/sell platform, but thats a lot later
-The bitz will be heavy in gw items only at first, probably will only get other bitz through a buy them from the customer program. Bitzing out hordes and warmachine is a pain, tried it already.


any manufacturers i forgot to list???
its a big list, got a pile of literature on these people in the industry, half of it is junk... can't believe some of these companies actually are in business.. sort of gives me confidence to see them doing it.

id take suggestions, just tell me a link to look at whom your talking about

Mantic.. get mantic!

And.. if you are doing bits reselling/stocking.. consider trying to develop a method of getting European (and by that I mean Poland) bits manufacturers into the USA.. Scibor, MaxMinis, etc..

Thinking about mantic games... might be a later addition, i do like the khaos dwarfs... those look fun. Kings of war is pretty good for stuff that most people havnt hear dof, typically when somebody says - "hey buy this!!" its a bunch of hot muff cabbage.

As for my encounter in todays large buy.

Here are the highlights.

STUFF TO SELL NIB
[Admin edit - List of stuff removed]

STUFF TO PUT TO THE BITZ
[Admin edit - List of stuff removed ]

[Sorry. The removed lists resembled trade lists too closely. That kind of talk is strictly limited to trade forum. -Admin]

I put a lot of money into orks and marines... in fact only orks and marines for 40k, figured that loads and loads of marines is always good b/c there is umpteen different armies for them. And orks just bitz out really well too.

I think id try dark eldar next time, and then go for some chaos marines faction bitz, and of coarse, more marines. Im gonna need more stage trays soon - I can tell.

Im going to catalog everything and get them into bins then ill post a index for the bitz stock (weekly???)

The experience itself was cool, because I had to look at the stuff and it was fun to imagine/visualize. My brian said something like this "ok, I could have this stuff and well, hell, that's a lot of bitz to cut out right now..... I could get these stompas, those are good for just selling, and i could let em go cheap - people would like that..... Wait a minute, I could get all of this in only space marines and have a ton of SM bitz!...... not enough storage bins... better get the friggin stompas...." And by then I think I was drooling. Spent $1400. Got a good enough deal to sit on a load of bitz and hook up btown traders with some nib stuff to recover some capital. It was worth the effort. I think the guy wished i took it all, but what the heck, I don't have the store shelves yet, and if i did, id probably need an even better deal to forgo using our accounts anyhow. I think he needs to pay his bills or something, I talked him down at the last second. used a move I learned on American pickers or storage wars or something

used a move I learned on American pickers or storage wars or something

Somebody "bundled." : )


Eric

terminator Storm shields
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I thanked athelu for the recommendations on the above list, but i did it in the admin edit again.

here it is again.

Thanks for suggesting that stuff, I got plenty of it!