N880EAP wrote:Have never sold any of my Elvis items (believe it or not). Have given some things away, but never sold.
(But, just like John said, ... that's not to say that someday I won't. I don't think anything is worth that much though. In general, when it comes to any mass produced item, I'd kind of feel guilty fleecing - e.g., 100% markup - somebody though.)
For me, it's just a hobby/one form of enjoyment .... nothing more. (I could be wrong, but I tend to think that converting one's hobby into a business ..... is probably a good way to ruin it either completely or to varying degrees. At least I think it would be that way for me.)
I feel exactly the same way. It's my hobby, my favorite pastime to escape the everyday troubles, and I swore to myself a long time ago "never to earn money with it in any way".
alberta sheffield wrote:If I had a business sense, which I don't have, I should easily buy every book and CD combo from FTF, wait a year or more and sell it with a profit (which , I am sure, some people do) ...but somehow I just don't do it.
A similar (cynical?) thought occurred to me a few days ago: With the strategy that the FTD label is pursuing (the limitation of already exclusively marketed and high-priced collector's items not intended for re-release), it would actually be appropriate to always buy 2 copies of an FTD product, use one of them for your own pleasure, leave the other one untouched, wait a few years and sell the sealed copy for at least twice the price to some desperate collector, so that you can break even...
Honestly, I don't understand the label's strategy. Why punish everyone who comes late to the party or can't afford to spend a higher three-digit amount per year on books and CDs? Why are the products not being reissued, even though there is obviously a demand for them? Why are there no alternative sales channels, such as streaming and ebooks?
John wrote:I'm in the process of moving. I have 5 huge, heavy cardboard boxes full of Elvis CDs along with about half a dozen books. As far as the CDs are concerned, for the last few years I have ripped them on receipt, and never played them. The earlier CDs were played, but rarely. Again, ripped and transferred to an mp3 player, which is the way I listen to them, but again, not often.
The books have all been read once apart from the music reference books. Those have been looked through quite often.
All of the music is backed up on two hard drives and two iPods, also several memory cards. They take up less than half the space of any of the FTD "The Making Of" boxes.
I did sell a lot of bootleg CDs and LPs a couple of years ago, and I have whole bunch more to sell, which I'll do after I move.
At my age, I'm beginning to think this collection is going to cause a problem for my children. It's probably worth £20 - 30 thousand, maybe more, but they'd never sell it in one go. It'll take them ages.
If someone offered me a decent amount today, I reckon I'd take it.
Though I don't really care what happens after my death, I've already thought about at least giving my heirs a hint that the one or other item might be worth something. But maybe I'll also give them the idea of simply donating the items to the Christmas raffle of the next best Elvis club.
