It's Black Friday but my crew is in the warehouse today getting orders shipped out and photographing merit badges. My son is handling the camera duties and I am working on NOAC issues. We have some leftovers in the fridge ready for lunch time. I am traveling a week from today to attend the NCAC Trade-O-Ree at Camp Snyder....Read More
As a married person tell me if you have ever tried to pull this off. My wife is out of town for a few days studying for a financial exam she is taking for her job. I told her I was finally going to tackle a complete makeover of our garage. So for the last two days I have been...Read More
I saw on Facebook yesterday that Larry Lane is working to update a list of Scouting museums across the country. This list also includes many council displays that might hang in the office or out at camp. But importantly he is seeking to identify who is considered the "curator" of these collections. It got me thinking that 2025 would...Read More
When these three boxes arrived from New Mexico I didn't really know what I was going to find. I knew some of the background from speaking to the family but had no idea I would find an absolute display piece jewel in this collection. I have been collecting Air Scout and other Senior Scouting items for going on a...Read More
It's not every collection that I find stuff that I've never seen before! I have been buying Boy Scout collections for more than a decade now and this one had some first time keepers. The collection came from a family where the dad is an Eagle Scout from the 1940s in Montana. I got the items from the son who...Read More
I spent all day today reloading merit badges into the store. In the most recent sort we did I came up with hundreds of mint condition merit badges. I have previously listed almost all of them so with the software we use it was easy to restock them. eBay also makes it very easy to increase the quantity available on live...Read More
Today I picked up a $1500 order for the cards that go in Best Hobby Pages envelopes. It's part of the churn that every so often I have to write a big check to keep the old saying "Got Plastic We Do" alive. Luckily since the beginning I have walled off the BHP within my business so the finances remain separate and...Read More
I have been a member of a resllers book club for a few years and just Sunday I was able to put into action one of fundamental takeaways from reading a book called The Pumpkin Plan. That is the idea of an immutable law - generally 2-3 rules that you create for your business to help guide you in how to...Read More
I listen to a lot of eBay YouTube and many sellers have complained that the tensions of the election cycle seemed to be suppressing sales. I don't really have any empirical evidence to back that up other than my last 30 day sales are down 25% from the prior term. But hopefully things will get back to normal as we...Read More
I've got a quick update for you on the project matrix that I created for the business. I have been working the board and have almost completely cleared all of the high priority projects off the matrix. Yesterday I started photographing about 4-5 disparate boxes of random "good" stuff" like felt camp patches, OA, jamboree sets etc. The last...Read More
My crew has been on a 3-day trip to Philly and thanks to good food and walking a neat city we have had fun. I even saw this sign hanging above the door or a Cheesesteak diner (Campo's) and wondered what in the world is the connection?! I was very tempted to strike up a conversation with the Girl Scouts...Read More
Every week I get contacted by someone looking to sell their Scouting memorabilia. Yesterday I got a call from a very stirred up old timer. He had a one of a kind item that he was sure was worth a lot of money. He had looked on eBay and saw a shadow box that someone was offering for thousands and...Read More
I got a little distracted today at work and never hit the send button on today's Hot Finds. So I apologize but here is your regular issue. CLICK HERE TO OPEN THE OCTOBER 29, 2024 ISSUE OF THE SCOUTING HOT FINDS NEWSLETTER
For the first time in a number of months I am happy to announce a sale running on Russell Smart's store SmartScoutPatches.com. The coupon code SMART25 will get you a 25% discount on your order. The store features hundreds of vintage OA flaps and odd shapes for sale from his personal collection. I was able to get some extra hours in the...Read More
At the end of the summer we printed 3000 1-page flyers to promote Trade-O-Rees all over the country in our eBay orders. We have officially burned through 1/2 of that stack. I know even this weekend their are multiple shows going on. I hope you are able to support your local events. It looks like the only TOR I...Read More