Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion Thefts at Swap Meets Increasing

I thought of something else. About 8 years ago I did the Meteri?, Georgia show. When I was very busy shuting down a guy offered me what I thought was a rare handy-oiler. My mistake, I boutht it, looked at it later, and it was a complete rip-off.
A week later both he and I were at Turkey Run in Florida, and guess what, he had no recollection of selling me anything.

My point, the guys to steal/rip people off are not new to this hobby or the auto hobby, they just try to figure out something they can sell or steal to make them selves some money. All the discussion in the world will not rid ourselves of them, it will take someone who catches them in the act.

Jack Sim

Thieves have always been just that, thieves. Don't give them the excuse of gas prices or hard times. They weren't raised right most likely. I caught a kid stealing off one of my jobs many years ago, chased him around the back of the station and found his dad loading up more of my equipment. The reason we have more thieves now is because they breed, these POS's think they're entitled. If you blame the economy you might as well say it's the politicians fault, can't you just hear it in court. "President Bush made my client steal" BU****IT

Good points made here. I know one thing for sure every day in the news in our little neck of the woods there are more and more murders people are going bonkers.

Maybe vendors should be carrying stun guns to zap would-be theives. Just don't jump the gun and zing somebody innocently looking at your items!

Saw a bumper sticker on a truck the other day. I thought was a good message:

STEAL HERE, DIE HERE.

I fly my Marine Corps Flag 24-7 to let the SOB's know who they are dealing with.

Semper Fidelis, Devil Dogs.

I think is lack of money, more than gas prices..

altho, they may have to steal more to recover cost of gas driving there!

In Feb here they started Grants Law.. everyone prepays gas or by card before pumping.. named after the poor kid whotried to stop a G&R and got dragged to his death..

From now on just take pictures of your stuff and put them on the table at the show.

I witnessed a theft 2nd hand at a carswapmeet recently.From a very well known gentle vendor who always attends and sells car detailing items like Meguiars waxes,Scotchbrite pads,Chamois rags,Nylon brushes,gloves etc.
He surrounds himself in around what appears to be nearly 50ft. of tables.
I watched him start yelling at a stranger for some reason then proceeded to try jump over the corraled tables,but couldn't fast enough as the stranger ran away.We all listened as the vendor finally started to yell "Stop that Thief!".
No less then 6 guys,complete onlookers,unselfishly grabbed the running thief and held him down.The showfield staff arrived and took him away to wherever as they weren't Police.
The appreciative vendor later told us he took a handfull of detailing toothbrushes and a pocket full of Scotchbrite pads.Roughly $14.00 worth of merchandise.
We wondered what happened to the thief,as I never saw any Police vehicles arrive later on.


[This message has been edited by coldpizza (edited 04-27-2008).]

Maybe there scraping them for cash,it's at a all time high here.I don't think they would take the time or are smart enough to sell them on ebay. ??
Joe

I think money is getting tighter for everyone. When the price of fuel goes up it effects everything we buy. Look at milk,eggs,cerial & the list goes on & on. In my oppinion when one bussiness "The oil co's" Start jacking the price up to squeese every penny they can out of us it wont take long for all other bussiness to follow. That is what we are seeing now. I also agree that some people just have the addiction to steal. It does make all of us mad but I am afraid it is going to only get worse Just my 2 cents!!

Hi Travis,

Wouldn't theft of your vending machines be covered by your insurance carrier? If not, why wouldn't they cover theft?

And what exactly is happening to these vending machines once they are sold? Are they being re-sold ... or just taken apart to get access to the money inside?

Chad

chadhaas,

No they are not covered by insurance because it would cost more then the machines are worth to insure them if you could even get it. There are no insurance companies that will give venders like me insurance on these machines since they are in other peoples stores - now if they store owner owned them they could get them covered - but when it comes down to theft of my machines I am just out. This is a business wide problem for guys like me because there is not enough mark up in the candy to pay sales tax most of the time, especially now that gas is 3.50 a gallon. The smaller candy machines are going the way of the Payphone and will be gone and no longer found in about 3-5 years MAX.

The stolen machines are ending up on ebay all day long - they put new locks on them and sometimes they even sell them with the ownership stickers on them - but you never get them back - EVER.

PS - I love Beaverton - my best friend Matt was from there and his dad is Phil Knight the founder of Nike has his main office in your town and they just live up the road in Hillsboro. I would move there in a heartbeat if I could afford the high home prices. P.S. it must be nice not to have to pay Sales Tax huh?


Travis E. Towle
Topeka, Kansas

Hi Travis,

Thanks for opening up my eyes to this problem. Your situation is plain awful.

Yes, no sales tax is nice, but the state gets taxes you somwhere else so it's six of one, a half-dozen of the other. Oregon is a great state to live; maybe our nations finest.

Chad

Hi, most thieve's to me are nuthen more to me then like bad cockroache's , you gotta stomp em out, and real bad when they do steal from people , becuse it there's hobby,mosy people at show's have ton of hour's and labor to make a nice show, then some low life steal from him , then becuse of that we dont see him again, then you got a bad rep at that show and show gets a bad rep, but yes i had it done at my table and his family was setup and we went over there and this guy , tryed to say his kid didnt do it, what they didnt know was i help start this swap meet 28 years ago and we banned him from coming there again, so yes i wacth over your stuff ,cause i stay right there,it's sad when you gotta steal and you have a brand new 2008 chevy pickup at your swap meet spot.

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Everett F Koppen

i hope you guys remeber the good guys also...


...2 years ago in Brimfield Mass. i forgot my fanny pack in the portable outhouse city, i did not realize it for 5 minutes, went back & it was gone....My car keys & $4000 were gone.......after 3 hours of checking the Heart of the Mart office i thought all was lost, then i got a phone call from the office telling me somebody turned in my bag...sure enough everything was there, even the money.......i then went to the vendors booth to give this Mentonite or Amish family a reward, which they would not accept saying it was the right thing to do..i then put a nice reward on their table & told them to donate it to their favorite cause........

It never ceases to amaze me the greatness of some people.......

That is also true there relic's. My heart would of stopped for sure LOL.