Here's a blue sky, thinking out loud kind of thread.
Some folks have mentioned that there wasn't a lot of gear for swapping at the Fest this year and they were right; Mario and Stephen really brought 75% of it. And they probably took 75% of that 75% home with them as the LPs were far and away the big sellers, except for the killer deals on the marble slabs.
What I'm wondering is if for 2009 we can't come up with some sort of way for folks to post wants and offers for items BEFORE the Fest, and effectively use the Fest as a big Pony Express stop where buyers from here can get gear from there?? If we created a Swap thread where folks could post "Wanted" and "Offers", maybe we can get more stuff moving around. Say I'm looking for a Heath W-5M with the 16458 tranny, so I post a "Wanted". Somebody down in say Missouri who's coming sees my post, PM's me and we hook up. Or vice versa.
I certainly have more stuff I could have brought to sell, but loading up 6 sets of speakers 2 years ago from my demo room, really takes the wind out of one's sails about dragging this stuff around. OTOH, if I knew I had a prepaid buyer for AKFest delivery, that's a whole different story. BTW, I'm not trying to circumvent any AK Classifieds either as we could set up some ground rules about donations to AK comparable to table fees for any deals completed.
Just food for thought, but I'd really like to promote this sort of thing a bit more next year.
Some folks have mentioned that there wasn't a lot of gear for swapping at the Fest this year and they were right; Mario and Stephen really brought 75% of it. And they probably took 75% of that 75% home with them as the LPs were far and away the big sellers, except for the killer deals on the marble slabs.
What I'm wondering is if for 2009 we can't come up with some sort of way for folks to post wants and offers for items BEFORE the Fest, and effectively use the Fest as a big Pony Express stop where buyers from here can get gear from there?? If we created a Swap thread where folks could post "Wanted" and "Offers", maybe we can get more stuff moving around. Say I'm looking for a Heath W-5M with the 16458 tranny, so I post a "Wanted". Somebody down in say Missouri who's coming sees my post, PM's me and we hook up. Or vice versa.
I certainly have more stuff I could have brought to sell, but loading up 6 sets of speakers 2 years ago from my demo room, really takes the wind out of one's sails about dragging this stuff around. OTOH, if I knew I had a prepaid buyer for AKFest delivery, that's a whole different story. BTW, I'm not trying to circumvent any AK Classifieds either as we could set up some ground rules about donations to AK comparable to table fees for any deals completed.
Just food for thought, but I'd really like to promote this sort of thing a bit more next year.