Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion Cost averaging as a new collector & pump hobbyist.

I'm still pretty new to the hobby but wanted to share with other new collectors how some recent deals brought me out on the right side of investing in Petroliana and Collectibles. Recently I headed out on a couple road trips to pick up pumps and landed (7) electric pumps, a lubester, a freestanding oil can display, a vintage 40's cigarette machine, a collectible sign and some odds and ends picked up along the way on 2 road trips.

Knowing some of the pieces I wanted for my own collection, I made a couple purchases where I knew I'd end up with some pieces I could sell that I had low interest in. When I got them home, I put the extra items on display, advertised (3) pumps for sale along with some other pieces purchased, and have since sold enough to recapture all of the capital I put out on both trips including my fuel and hotel expenses.

The net result is that I now have (4) vintage pumps, a lubester, a freestanding can display and a restored Cigarette machine that now have no costs against them. As a newbie in the hobby who's occasionally smart with a dollar, that's a great lesson in cost averaging and puts me where I need to be as a new collector. Perhaps I'm starting to learn one of the tricks to the hobby and have caught on to one of the better ways to get into an Oil & Gas collecting at today's prices. Buy bulk, sell the excess for profit and cost down the pieces you keep for yourself! I'm not at all trying to brag here, just sharing a strategy with others who like me may be new to collecting, and showing that you can still collect some cool pieces without having to spend so much of your after tax dollars. While this may not work for everyone, I'm starting to learn that this can work for me...and I'm adapting to a better way of purchasing while I advance my collection. Here are some of the pieces that have recently worked into my collection with minimal cost against them.

Hope this suggestion helps others who may have been a little reluctant to jump in with both feet. Besides, doing a road trip and meeting other collectors is absolutely great fun! Hope to do some more road trips in the near future and collect some more cans and signs along to way.

Bennett 646 and Bennett 541


Bennett 543 (nice original)


Gilbarco 96 and Vintage Cigarette Machine


Matching Lubester to the themed GB 96

Should add note that a couple of the pumps above will become restoration projects for me over the next 6 months. As I enjoy working with my hands, I'll restore these myself and trust they will become some of my favorite pieces since I plan to have my two young boys out in the shop while they learn to turn wrenches over the winter months. Pictures to follow when they start going back together.

Good to see someone in the same frame of mind as myself. I believe (especially when you are financially strapped as I am) you can have a balance of making a profit to fund your hobby, without ripping others off.

Excellent finds and best of luck to ya Graeme.

Graeme
PM me a list of your pumps for sale with some pictures.
Next time bring back a visible, I need another for the fromt of my shop! LOL

I smell an accountant with a petro addiction...

I need a co-hort for another road trip Johnny. Got word on 12 pumps down south that include 3 visibles, 6 clocks and 3 electrics on a decent deal. It's a long drive though at 3200 miles return. You wanna go?

Graeme-- keep coming south I have more pumps to sell....

OK...here we go again.

Calling you right now Tom. lol

If you go past Walla Walla stop by. Richard

Will do Richard. If I end up heading down the coast again I'll pass through Spokane and will stop in on ya this time round. Thanks

Wow sounds like fun guys!

Sounds like, Scott & Sheldon (Canadian Pickers) have some competition brewing in Calgary. It's going to be Graeme and Johnny picking USA!

I gotta go see those boys this week. They have a sign I want but I keep missing them at the Livery.

Canada/USA Border has been CLOSED except for Tourist & Snow Bird Only Crossing!

OK...label me a tourist cause I'm dropping in on the Monroe County swap meet when I'm down as well. Seattle, Oregon, Cali...here I come again. Any good vineyards found in Santa Paula?

ZERO, DRY Pump/Vineyard County

OK, then I'll bring some wine down from Napa Valley, and we can go look around the Fruit Orchards and Avocado Farms for a few hidden Pumps. LOL

NOPE

Gascam.
You are also missing a very important part if the buying and selling.
Around 1988 I started buying petro items I purchase everything a guy didn't want in a bulk plant. I brought home over 100 gas pumps. Within another year I was up to 200 gas pumps.
I was going and setting up at 22 shows per year selling stuff, in between we were attending all kinds of yard sales, auctions, estate sales all over the place.
When we got married in 1988 I found out my wife knew dolls, antique jewlry, glasswasre, silverware, watches and a few more I can't remember. I knew automobiles, when I was 24 and just out of the army I belonged to the Horless Carriage Club here in St. Loui. Because of my knowledge of the very early auto models (1900-19210) I used to judge these cars at the shows. I also had a working knowledge of paper, coins, stamps, old tools, jute boxes, sold machines and other coin operated machines. My wife and I started buying value guides, we still have about 150 of them packed away. Instead of watching TV we would sit by the hour reading these guides. We just wasnted a working knowoledge as to what was worth money.
My best example: Radio show here in St. Louis to sell things. Guy offers a parking meter (I still have it), jumped in the car, bought it for $10.00. Now here is where having knowledge of other items can make you money. I was all ready at the guys house so I asked him if he had anything else for sale. Said he had this old three piece train set for $10.00 (it was a Marx).
Also had a large portfolio filled with salesmasn samples for calendars. It was from the Brown & Biggelo Calendars Co. The sales man would make calls in small towns, when he went in a beauty shop he showed the owner the baby pictures she could use for next year calendar. At the barber show he would show the barber the pin-ups.
A bulb went off in my head, I remember from having read something in one of the value guides that pin-ups were worth money. Again paid !0.00 for the portfolio. Went home and pulled out the value guides looking up the artists of the drawings. Discovered Maxfield Parrish (and we had a 6 drawings by him each worth $200.00 each. Other names still in my head Moran, Eldridge, all their pinups worht $40.00 to $50.00 each. We eventually sold them all for over $2000.

I and DB have both been pushing knowledge, not just of the petro items, but all the stuff in the barn or attic. That pedal car laying under the straw might be worth more that all the pumps you just bought, so broden your knowledge of everything old. I have also spotted items at a farm auction that no one even knew what it was, and I got it for next to nothing.

Jack Sim

That's great advice Jack and thank you for sharing that. On my last trip, I scoured a few decent antique shops looking at art and other collectibles. I did end up buying a few other items on my last trip which included a Popeye neon sign, Drive In speakers, a Condom Machine and the Cigarette machine, and just missed out on an old pedal car that was in the form of an old plane.

My eye's are open and I'm still learning Jack. I love all things old. Some as keepers, and some I look at to net some dough against my addictions of Oil & Gas. :-)

Graeme with the luck your having you better take a big trailer, 3200 miles of picking you could fill a wharehouse.
Post some pix when you get back.

Wish I had enough time and money to do that, but business suffers if I'm away too long. Here's the next trip being routed up, and the wagon I can squeeze a good haul into. Always have the back of the truck as overflow. LOL


Another west coast trip being planned out.


Gascans Redneck Pump Wagon


Gascan and the Redneck flying down the Interstate

Looks like you are coming through Butte.....

Only if you put your guns away and take the noose down outta your tree! lmfao

3-7-77

My problem is when I get something I don't want sell it.

That's why, we are collector's. As collector's, we all share in that dilemma...to sell or not.