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Charity Shop Vinyl

My local Oxfam has an entire floor dedicated to vinyl and on balance I think their pricing seems fair, they can be too high on the rare stuff and there is no chance of picking up any classical wide band deccas for 50p any more, but I have still bought big ticket items from them (Tubby Hayes, William Russo etc.) as I wanted them. On the run of the mill stuff they can still be a few pounds over the typical online price but what you pay extra there you save on the exorbitant cost of postage of buying online. I think it's always nicer to be a able to find something you want in a shop so perhaps paying a premium for that is not a bad thing and ultimately it's all for a good cause.
 
If it's not too far to travel I'd say it's worth a visit for the Oxfam alone, they have a good selection of most genres, I'd put a rough estimate on them having something like 5,000+ LP's in stock, plus singles and CDs and the book section is good too.
 
I volunteer in the local Oxfam shop, and price vinyl very fairly. Ultimately, our stock is completely dependent on what people bring to us, so someday you may be lucky, someday not. A lot more Oxfam stock is now being sold in their online store
 
Just been to Headway Brain Injury charity shop that I sort the records for -

Somebody bought the Jasper Carrott! (I thought it would sell) nrMint for a quid - worth a punt if you like old comedy.

Best of Spirit went for £4 - it was a bit tatty, but played okay.
Cleared £7 for a super clean Herman’s Hermits L.P.
a Frank Sinatra greatest hits made £2.

The 7” Singles are selling well- Dr. Hook/. The Troggs / Steve Harley / The Specials / Procul Harum etc. all priced at £1 or over -

I clean up the 7”ers and play-test them - they can often look okay, but be poor on playback.
Going to clean up 20 or so today if I get around to it.

The 7” Singles are definitely getting Shoplifted though - swines…. I need to buy some more pvc 7” sleeves as they get stolen as well. Pigdogs.
 
Ok, these are charity shop CDs and not vinyl but I couldn't see a thread. £15 for the following! Bloke on the tills said someone had just bought 30 CDs before I was there!
Slint - Spiderland
Wailing Souls at Channel One 7's & 12's and versions
Yabby You Dub it to the top
Gregory Issues remixed
Kanye West Jesus is King
Hieroglypics Full Circle
Car Seat Headrest teens of denial
Buzzcocks Going Steady singles
Boards of Canada Tomorrow's Harvest
Uptown Xo Colour de Grey
Temples Holy Serpent
Slumvillage Fantastic Vol11
Zappa/Beefheart Bongo Fury
Zappa/ Mothers Roxy and Elsewhere
Eno Music for Films
Anderson Park Malibu
 
Out of interest what’s the most PFM’ers have paid for a vinyl record from a chazzer?
About 15 years ago I bought two John Surman ECM albums in excellent nick from Oxfam for £20.
Wouldn’t normally pay anything like that but I wanted the two albums for a while and just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
 
Fuller said:
Out of interest what’s the most PFM’ers have paid for a vinyl record from a chazzer?
About 15 years ago I bought two John Surman ECM albums in excellent nick from Oxfam for £20.
Wouldn’t normally pay anything like that but I wanted the two albums for a while and just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
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I sell expensive donations on Discogs, £15 plus/plus for Headway Brain injury charity online via Discogs.

In the shop, I can get away with up to £14, but I try to peak at £9 for an album.

The problem is that if I try and put expensive records in the charity shop, they get stolen. :(

I often price albums that are worth £15-25 at £9 because it brings people back to the shop, they know they are getting a bargain. I try to price stuff to sell rather than be dead stock.

for 45’s - 7’ Singles I try and peak at £4 in the shop - again, the more expensive I go, the more they get nicked.
 
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The Oxfam online store seems to price vinyl at high discogs prices - £25 for a techno 12” with a £17 median on discogs for example, which kind of takes the fun out of it.
 
tedmanzie said:
The Oxfam online store seems to price vinyl at high discogs prices - £25 for a techno 12” with a £17 median on discogs for example, which kind of takes the fun out of it.
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I agree - I think Oxfam price too high for their records. I haven’t looked at the Oxfam online record store for years, because they price too high.

I use the Discogs median as a guide, plus how many people indicate that they ‘want’ the record.
As always, condition is the main guide. I aim to price items as significantly less than average price, unless NrMint/NrMint.
I have just binned several 7” singles that Discogs have various prices from £5 to £20 - the records have never been purchased, and nobody wants them = waste of time.

I enjoy the process, and often listen to records that I don’t know - it helps that I have a good ear for a catchy tune - especially when Northern Soul records are hiding :)
 
Big Tabs said:
I agree - I think Oxfam price too high for their records. I haven’t looked at the Oxfam online record store for years, because they price too high.

I use the Discogs median as a guide, plus how many people indicate that they ‘want’ the record.
As always, condition is the main guide. I aim to price items as significantly less than average price, unless NrMint/NrMint.
I have just binned several 7” singles that Discogs have various prices from £5 to £20 - the records have never been purchased, and nobody wants them = waste of time.

I enjoy the process, and often listen to records that I don’t know - it helps that I have a good ear for a catchy tune - especially when Northern Soul records are hiding :)
Click to expand...

Sounds like you've got a good approach! Where's your shop?
 
Saying “Oxfam price too high” is too simplistic. I agree that some Oxfam record pricers get it wrong, but many get it right. The point is that the people who list records for Oxfam Online (of whom I am one) comprise 100s of volunteers. I check the vinyl listings several times every day and the desirable items are either priced right or too low, because they sell in minutes. The records that hang around are either priced too high or are too common/obscure/undesirable.

It’s the same in the Oxfam shops. Most people go straight to the rock section and it’s difficult to keep that stocked because it flies off the shelves. If we could get more jazz, that would fly as well.
 
How far behind the curve of vinyl popularity do you think Charity Shops are?

Vinyl was all there was before about 1985 and from about 1989 to 2002 as CD took over very little was sold. Then sales started really taking off. So a gap of 13 years.

Loads of good pre-CD stuff came up in chazzers until about 2009 in my experience and since it's been a lot harder to find good stuff. Maybe that means we're about due to start seeing the next wave of post-CD vinyl coming through? The older vinyl buyers starting to shuffle off to the great record fair in the sky perhaps.

We can only hope :) Any flaws in that theory?
 
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