Boat jumbles - bad reputation?

[Koeketiene]

In quite a few recent threads people have linked theft to boat jumbles.

Any facts to substantiate this? Any first-hand experiences?

Is it a deserved reputation?

I have always found boat jumbles an invaluable tool to keep the price of boating down at a reasonable level.

 

[ChrisE]

Well, the plods around my neck of the woods treat this seriously enough to send a couple of their number to the local shows....

 

[FullCircle]

...which is why I believe it is not inherently a thieves paradise. They check all the outboards serails and some electronics. Nowhere to hide....

 

[raven]

Well, I recently attended the Northern Boat Jumbly at Middlewich and there were a number of very dodgy looking people hanging around the snack-van. However, I expected that because it was the spot at which it had been agreed YBW Forumites would meet! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

On the whole the event was very well run and I guess that the majority of stands were operated by "professional" retailers. Certainly there were some bargains to be had on both new and used equipment.

On reflection there were some traders operating around the margins that were selling goods where (lets say) the provenance could be difficult to establish, but I think that on the whole it was a pukka operation.

 

[Slow_boat]

Not everyone has a record of the serial number of every bit of valuable equipment.

Half the gear going through boot sales is dodgy, why not boat jumbles?

 

[FullCircle]

If I was a burglar, would I try and flog it at a boat jumble where I might get a result, and possibly have my collar felt, or on ebay where it goes out of the door in 7 days regardless, and some sap will come and pick it up, or I make even more by posting it at inflated rate.

 

[Blueboatman]

..which reminds me.I used to (as per police suggestion) scribe my postcode on anything of value left on board when I had a swinging mooring-not across the back,discretely,but right over the facia of the vhf on the body of the windgenereator,along the edges of the solar panel etc..Worked for me.
Why be part of the supply side of dodgy ebay and jumbles? /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[Major Catastrophe]

[ QUOTE ]

Well, I recently attended the Northern Boat Jumbly at Middlewich and there were a number of very dodgy looking people hanging around the snack-van.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, they were there last year as well. I asked the local plods to run them off the manor this year, but they were prolly too busy playing with the camera van down at Crewe.

Sad that the Northern Boat Jumble attracts these down and outs and it makes the second-hand gear on offer look shoddy.

 

[Searush]

Come-on give a bloke a chance to make a dishonest living! All that effort to nick a van, borrow a dinghy, break & enter a dozen abandoned yachts. All that stuff to unload from the dinghy into the van. I mean, there's more handling than stealing! Then you get to the pub/ boot sale/ jumble etc and all them rich yotties haggle you down to rock bottom to get their own gear back.

Nahh, it's not a sensible career option any more, and I can't even stick to mugging old ladies leaving the PO on a Thursday since they stopped paying out pensions in cash. Life is getting tough.

 

[Sixpence]

Trying to visualise you as a mugger of old ladies coming out of the post office




Nope , can't do it /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[oldharry]

I believe statistics show (or used to) that Hamble and other such places have rash of thefts in the weeks preceding Beaulieu, and it was standard practice if you had anything nicked to go and buy it back. Know of someone who did just that when a set of brass portholes was nicked from his restoration project.

The Police also reckon there is a brisk trade up and down the M25 between the east and South Coast - the E coast receiving the South coast booty, and vice versa. In our part part of the world the law will stop and check any van moving late at night as a matter of course, they tell me. Not just boat gear, but motorbikes and other large moveable objects.

Think about it, if the Police are putting that much effort into checking out boat jumblies, then they must have a pretty good reason for it: I once saw them marching off a stall holder and his load of 'bargains' from a jumble. I also remember seeing them forcing a guy who had brought a load of cheap antifouling decanted into unmarked tins to close down and leave a jumble. Presumably lack of Health and safety warnings, or maybe he was selling TBT based or similar.

But FWIH, the most common disposal point is the Car Boot sale, or the pub nowadays.

A few years ago I lamented the fact that the 'true' jumblies were disappearing from the Boat Jumbles in favour of the dealers selling off old or discontinued stock at retail, and new items ABOVE even local swindleries! All with no comeback for faulty or damaged goods that apply to shop traders. Perhaps thats because the Plod are actually succeeding in scaring off the light fingered brigade from these events?

 

[Major Catastrophe]

Don't have that sort of problem at the Northern Jumble in Middlewich. Far too posh. It's just the shifty bunch that hangs around the tea wagon that bothers me.

Too be a bit more serious for a moment, but every boat jumble I go to I have a look at Jimmy Green's and then see that I can buy just about anything they have for sale off another stalls at least 25% cheaper.

Question is, why do people pay their prices, when they can walk ten metres and get it cheaper?