Money no object ! buy what you want !

[SOMMESOLDIER]

Hi There,

I have wondered about this for quite sometime !

What would happen to the market in First World War items if someone very wealthy became involved ?

I know prices would go up, but what I am really getting at, is if you had someone very wealthy who had a real interest in collecting as do many of us, and they got involved and threw money around would it kill the whole thing over night ?

Is it a nightmare of my world, or a possibility ??

Cheers

Tim.

[John_Hartley]

Doesnt seem overly likely except in speciific areas where there is a rarity element. No-one, however wealthy, is going to want to collect everything that is available. And, along similar lines, prices only go up dramatically if more than one person is after it.

But if someone did start collecting on a major scale - say absolutely everything associated with the Cheshires - then I suspect a lot of you folks would be emptying your collections of Cheshire stuff fairly quickly.

John

[SOMMESOLDIER]

Hi John,

Thanks for your reply.

I know it is unlikely, but just imagine for one moment one of our overpaid footballers having a hobby to do with the First World War ?!!!! and they get into collecting !!

I know you were joking about the Cheshire collectors but there is a possible situation where the speculators got involved !!

My opinion is, that if that did happen, whichever area we are talking about would be totally over run and the real collectors with a real interest would be finished !!! Unless as you intimated, they sold out !!!!!

It would only be for a short term profit though !!!!!!

Cheers

Tim.

[Peter Beckett]

Tim,

I have thought of doing just that but the thought of attending my own funeral seems to stop me.

Peter

[SOMMESOLDIER]

Hi Peter,

Oh, I'm quite sure people would understand !!!!!!!!!!

Thinking about it, I am sure you're right !!

Please forgive me, for I have sinned !!!

Cheers

Tim

[DaveBrigg]

Hmmm know what you mean. Saw a death plaque go on Ebay recently for over £1000!. Wish I had the funds to get involved... for a lottery winner it would be peanuts. I used to look for WW1 postcards on Ebay with poems, but someone called 'leftpoet' always outbid on anything good. When I checked, he/she had spent hundreds that month. Anyone with six figure sums to spare could set up their own museum .

[Grovetown]

Depending on your interest, it's already happened.

1. Lord (Michael) Ashcroft has been single-handedly driving the VC market for years. Obviously, they are far beyond the reach of ordinary collectors - but his determination to buy more-or-less every one that has surfaced of late (he has around 100 now) took them totally stratospheric.

2. Peter Jackson - director of King Kong, Lord of the Rings etc - has been an RFC black hole for some time now too and, allegedly, is mopping up everything of quality that turns up.

Best wishes,

Grovetown.

[Gilgamesh of Uruk]

I suspect collectors would do what collectors always do - find a new niche which hasn't yet become fashionable, using the proceeds of realising their existing collection to build up a new one.