On 12/8/06, Jerome & Elizabeth Moos <jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>
> Hi, John. No I didn't think you were making the market, but I did figure
> the prices you offered reflected your assessment of where the market is,
> which is evidently higher than a few years ago. Now I figured you were
> going to resell the parts, presumably after matching some "orphans" to mates
> you already had, since after all you are in the business of buying and
> reselling parts. And I figured you weren't planning to lose money, and so
> your offer must be a little below your estimate of "retail" price. Now if
> this is for a bike of your own, maybe you don't need to turn a profit, but
> on the other hand, if one of the leading sellers of this sort of thing can't
> just take them out of inventory for his own project, then that is a pretty
> good indication that these parts are becoming somewat rare.
>
> Maybe this is an indication that most caches of NOS parts have already
> been discovered and depleted, and that NOS parts are going to be
> increasingly difficult and expensive to obtain. That's not a surprising
> conclusion considering that all this stuff is now at least 20 years old and
> some a lot older. Plus guys like yourself, Mike Kone, BC, Sheldon and in
> the past Bill Ward have been actively seeking out, buying and reselling this
> stuff for the better part of 10 years now. So maybe it's now reached the
> point where most of the inventories "left over" in distributor warehouses,
> bike shop parts bins and shutdown shops from the days when these were being
> made have now been depleted and most remaining inventories are now in the
> hands of collectors who place a higher value on this stuff. If so, then we
> can expect to pay a lot more than a few years ago. And you're right, the
> fact you didn't get many takers to your offers indicates that the offered
> prices were at or below the
> market.
>
> Now I think most of this applies specifically to NOS parts, and perhaps is
> not really applicable to used bits, even ones in excellent condition. I
> don't think I'm personally going to reap some windfall profit here, as most
> of my personal hoard is not NOS. I've never really been an enthuiastic
> buyer of NOS stufff for the simple reason that the minute you mount it, it
> isn't NOS any more, whereas excellent used is still excellent used after a
> couple of months of use. Now I have bought a fair amount of NOS parts when
> I could get them at only a modest premium over the cost of excellent used
> stuff. That used to happen fairly often, but perhaps it is now a thing of
> the past.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
Excellent distinction about NOS being the dividing line. Unless one is
> building up a wall hanger and intends to actually ride, the fact is
> that nice clean used bits are every bit as good as NOS and don't even
> generally make it onto the high rollers' radar screen. These are usually
> top quality parts that will last years of use and almost any part that costs
> an arm or a leg NOS can be had for a fraction in very good used condition.
> NOS is really only for hoarders/collectors and show bikes too pretty to ride
> I reckon. I'll never pay two or three times as much for a part that you'd
> probably need a jeweler's loupe to tell from a common VG-EX equivalent that
> would function exactly the same.
Kurt Sperry
Bellingham WA
USA