Old fashion and new function live side by side at the secondhand store - www.citizen-times.com

By Jean Greeson and Richard Fast
He Said, She Said

Dear Jean and Richard: These days, every time I visit an antique store, I see things I actually remember buying new. Am I really getting that old or is time speeding up? — Darlene, Atlanta
Richard: Hi, Darlene. It's a safe bet your age has little to do with it. My dog Izzy can remember some of the things I see in antique malls. The fact is, antique stores themselves have become somewhat antiquated, thanks to the Internet and inexpensive imports. In many cases, the more valuable items are auctioned on eBay to ensure the highest profit. Left over are usually more commonplace things or items too large to easily ship.

Jean: You have a point, but nothing a tall hat won't cover. There's more to shopping for antiques than finding “valuable” items. For me, nostalgia and whimsy appeal to my sense of adventure. I look for certain children's books and unusual carvings. My husband recently searched for a wooden ladder — not worth much on the market but hard to find new. When you discover a gem among all the rocks, it's exciting. In a real sense, antiquing is modern-day treasure hunting.
Richard: OK, what you're describing is more like Dumpster diving than serious shopping. Or rummaging through someone's attic to see what they can't quite bear to throw away. I maintain that a great many antique stores are really just secondhand stores, and even more supplement their inventory with new, often imported reproductions.
Jean: You'll have to admit we find some nice pieces of furniture in antique stores.
Richard: Yes, and those are the items too bulky to ship.
Jean: Yet we buy them for our clients and ship them ourselves. I admit there are some junk stores that use the term “antique” a little too casually. But it really depends on what you're looking for. I recently bought some Smurf glasses to give my adult children for Christmas because they loved the Smurfs when they were kids.
Richard: Wow, Christmas is really going to be special at your house. Imagine, antique Smurfs! I think the trick is to be discriminating about your antiques source. If you're looking for Smurf glasses, roadside malls — or even flea markets — might be just the ticket. If you're looking for furniture, I would check the higher-rent district, usually in a downtown area. With the Internet, even a novice dealer knows what a piece is worth. Don't expect any steals.
Jean: Darlene, when you're considering vintage furniture, I would encourage you to think about alternate uses, especially if their original functions may no longer be needed. Corner telephone tables are long obsolete but could be used as laptop stations. Sewing cabinets, iceboxes, early record players, pie safes and steamer trunks can find new life as storage for all sorts of household items.
Richard: Yes, but be sure to consider these items “novel” and work them into your décor primarily for interest. Upscale antique dealers rarely hold iceboxes in the same regard as a French Regency étagère.
Jean: Maybe, but either one could store my set of Smurf glasses. I'm giving you a Grumpy Smurf glass this year.

These are the opinions of nationally recognized interior designers Jean Greeson and Richard Fast, with offices in Asheville, Fort Lauderdale and Kansas City. Contact them with your question by visiting www.GreesonAndFast.com.

Feature Sidebar | Treasure Hunt: A subculture of busy “pickers” fuels the Utah antiques trade - slweekly.com

By Stephen Dark
Posted 10/09/2008

A little before 10 a.m. in late August outside the Deseret Industries thrift store on 700 South in downtown Salt Lake City, eight men wait for the doors to open

Two women with children who’ve come to look for kids’ clothes marvel at the crowd. “Who knew the DI was so popular?” one of them says.

But the men, who range in age from their mid-20s to late-50s, are following a time-honored tradition that each morning is repeated at several other thrift stores across the city. They are pickers – men and women who sell undervalued objects they find at yard sales and thrift stores, on eBay or to antique dealers -- and they are on their daily treasure hunt. You can almost feel the rising sense of expectation, of adrenalin, as DI staff members move toward the front doors.

The store manager unlocks the doors and the men rush along the aisles. At the head of the line, a young man with a backpack and an older man power-walk with jutted-out elbows in a race to get to the book carts first.

Two men go to a locked glass cabinet and toss a coin as to who gets the pick of bags of wrapped jewelry. Both are seeking copper and silver to sell, they say.

DI store employees chat with the pickers as they descend on the book carts in search of LDS books to complete collections. One bookseller has an electronic scanner he uses to check which books are in Amazon’s top 10 million. No. 1 says the online store sells 3,000 a day. The 10 millionth on the list moves once every five years. Many of the books on the carts go into the picker’s trolley and after being purchased for a couple of dollars apiece will go to a used bookstore’s warehouse.

Despite such a civilized approach, the pickers seem leery of publicity. One says to a City Weekly reporter, “They don’t want this advertised. It’s so competitive already. They won’t talk to you.”

Several pickers and books sellers at the downtown store and at other DI locations in the valley, after asking for anonymity, agreed to answer questions.

Each location it seems has been staked out by different pickers. In turn each store, depending on the management, takes a different approach to managing the group, pickers say. While the pickers’ conduct at the downtown store is civilized to the point of nonchalant, the Sugar House DI has a reputation for being brutal. Pickers allegedly yank armfuls of books off of carts and throw them into trolleys to check through in corners of the store. On the day a City Weekly reporter went to check this out, however, the eviscerating of the carts was done calmly enough.

“It’s a big gamble,” says one picker, who’s been doing this for eight years. “You never know if you’ll find anything.” And it’s not just books. Pickers specialize in anything from rare clothing to haute couture sunglasses and everything in between.

Some pickers are well known for, as one bookseller puts it, “trying to get everything for nothing. They make it hard for the rest of us.” Several pickers City Weekly talked to expressed concern that possible state legislation to regulate the Utah antiques industry like the pawnshop business would effectively kill it off. Antique dealers, they say, couldn’t afford the costs of compliance. They point to Reno, Nevada. After antiques’ businesses were regulated there, according to a recent article in an antique trade publication, not only did they all close down, but antique shows – the lifeblood of the industry – stopped going there.

Regulation isn’t the only threat to the antiques trade. Thanks to the electronic scanner and eBay, pickers enjoy greater commercial freedom than they did a few years ago. Now they can sell what they find on the Internet instead of going to antique dealers. Some dealers, though, still rely on pickers to be their eyes and ears in the market. A few minutes after the Sugar House DI store opened one day in early September, a picker was on his cell phone to a dealer asking if he wanted a complete set of Mormon texts in a locked cabinet.

Pickers hold dear the apocryphal tales of some of their kind discovering a $5 painting at a yard sale and selling it for $10,000, putting a new record on the artist’s work. But at times, it seems, the entire pursuit of treasure amidst so much discarded junk can get depressing. One picker remarked to his colleagues, “Sometimes it feels like we’re all in a mentally handicapped Easter egg hunt.”

But a bookseller says it’s the addiction of the hunt that keeps them all going. Which is why his heart races “when five other people are all looking for something and you grab it first.”

Antiques business owners react, adjust to economic climate - nwherald.com

By DIANA SROKA - dsroka@nwherald.com

Seven years ago, a normal week meant 300 or 400 customers would stop by Colonial Antique Mall in Woodstock, one of seven antiques shops in town.

But now, Lee Muto's antiques mall is the only one of its kind in Woodstock, and the average number of weekly customers is down to 100 or 150.

Across McHenry County, antiques business owners are watching shops close, sales drop and foot traffic decline. Although they agree that it's been a tough decade for the antiques market nationwide, there's debate over how much of the shift is because of the tumultuous economy or to a change in consumer tastes.

Many store owners attribute the shifts in the market to the rise of big-box stores such as Ikea, Target or Wal-Mart.

"People are wanting cheap and fast," Muto said. "If it fits in the corner and it works for them, they buy it. They're not interested in buying for the value."

Muto has been in the business for 35 years. She said the young adult generation, more than any other, turns to retail stores for furniture because they think it saves them money. But these young consumers might not be getting the deal they think, she said.

"That's a misconception, because antiques are usually less money than your Target and your cheap stuff," Muto said. "And [antiques] are made of real wood; they [will be] here forever."

The average all-wood dresser ranges from $195 to $250 at Colonial, Muto said, and there are dressers priced as low as $75 and as high as $900. According to the Ikea Web site, a chest of drawers not necessarily made of all wood can cost anywhere from $30 to $400.

But not all shoppers are opting for the retail furniture.

"Ikea is cool because it's throwaway furniture, ... but people are getting sick of the quality," said Lisa Santiago, sales manager at the Volo Antique Malls on Old Volo Village Road.

She said shoppers were opting for higher-quality pieces, and Hoosier cabinets had been particularly popular at the Volo malls in recent weeks. At the Volo malls, the price of these kitchen cabinets ranges from $495 to $525, Santiago said.

Hutch-style kitchen cabinetry from Target ranges between $200 and $549, according to the Target Web site.

Santiago declined to provide sales figures, but said sales took a dip after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. She said sales now were rising at the mall but hadn't bounced back to what they were before the terrorist attacks. However, from her perspective, customers haven't ruled out buying antique furniture or other home items.

"They find a way to afford it," she said. "They work hard to buy the piece."

Shoppers also are becoming increasingly more wary of how much they spend. It's not uncommon for customers to visit the store several times before making a purchase, or come back with a friend or spouse.

"They'll go home, think it over and come back," said Pat Miller, owner of Solid Brass Fine Antiques in Richmond. "People are very careful about how they spend their money."

Once customers nail down an item they'd like to buy, they're more prone to haggle down the price than they were in the past.

At most antiques shops, items are priced by dealers before they are placed on display and available for purchase. However, Santiago said, many customers are ignoring the tags and naming their own prices – requiring shop owners and dealers to accommodate this new trend.

"We do leave that door open," Santiago said. "We go out of our way to try and help the dealer."

Beyond negotiating prices, antiques business owners are paying special attention to the presentation of their items and their niche in the antiques market.

Miller's store in Richmond specializes in high-end antiques, such as military equipment, tools and clocks. Unlike other shops, many of Miller's items are geared toward men.

Miller's shop is one of eight remaining antiques hubs in Richmond. Ten years ago, there were 15 antiques shops in Richmond, and in 1972, Richmond was home to 40 antiques shops.

At the Volo antiques malls, dealers are encouraged to group like items together or create a scene, or vignette.

"If it's thrown together, ... they're not going to do well," Santiago said.

In spite of the challenging economy, antiques business owners are optimistic about the future of their market and convinced that business will re-ignite when the economy thrives again.

"As long as people have a business mind, they're going to be fine," Santiago said. "Everything that happens with the economy happens in antiques."

Tips for preserving antiques

• For furniture, leave the finish alone, even if it's stained.

• For books, don't oil leather book covers.

• For silver, avoid high-octane metal polishes.

• For brass, polish items regularly.

• For garden antiques, bring them indoors during winter or cover them to keep water from freezing over them.

Source: Antiques Roadshow Web site, www.pbs.org/roadshow