Model M sellers: where do you find your inventory?

[dellmodelm]

I'm not getting into selling myself, but there's something I've always wanted to know about those who do sell model Ms and other vintage/highly sought-after computer and A/V equipment: where do you find your inventory? (Specifically, where do you find your model Ms that you sell or resell?)

Over the summer, I drove all around my city and nearby suburbs, looking for any model M in any condition. I scoured Goodwill, Salvation Army, secondhand components stores, random thrift shops, and couldn't find a model M anywhere. I also looked in electronics recycling firms and the local community college (after a friend told me they liquidated old computer peripherals on occasion).

In all this searching, I came up empty. Eventually, the only way I could get my hands on a model M was to buy one on eBay. (Admittedly, it's a great board.)

Thank you for your insights. Please accept my apologies if this is "privileged" information.

[guidemetothelight]

I bought mine over the local equivalent of craiglist, ebay kleinanzeigen. Paid 30€ with shipping included, so not a bad deal at all.

[ArtyomTheMetroHopper]

Its not really privileged information.

Some people have contacts in state/public funded recycling centers that give them tip offs on any old electronical goods or allow them to visit and rummage through what they have recently taken in from disposals/collections. I usually see people with the most success with finding items from there, but unless you have a contact that works within that institution you will have no luck. State/public funded recycling centers will not under any circumstances allow members of the public to buy their scrap, especially electronics. The reason is always the same: the scrap is now owned by the local council/jurisdiction and the center has no authority on selling what they own. That's why its important to get a contact who can turn a blind eye.

For those of us who are not so lucky, you will need to use web stores to find your keyboards and other electronics. I am not an expert, but as someone who used to do 2 hour bounty hunts for keyboards daily I think I can give you a good overview on how to find good keyboards for sale:

First things first, eBay. Contrary to popular belief its actually pretty tricky to find good offers on keyboards via eBay, but its the most accessible and prevalent site for getting them second hand. There are a few search terms you should use to browse through and the list can be even use for other sites. These terms are the following:

• Old Keyboard

• Vintage keyboard

• Terminal keyboard

• Mainframe keyboard

• Broken keyboard

• Untested keyboard

• Office clearance keyboard

• Job lot keyboard

• Mechanical keyboard

• IBM keyboard

• Unicomp keyboard

There are a whole lot more out there you can try but these are the ones I personally use. I would also suggest using picclick over eBay as picclick compiles all of the listings off of eBay and allows you to see them in a grid as apposed to a list that eBay likes to do. This makes your searching a whole lot faster and picclick will even save your searches and create a live feed for any new listings that have cropped up. There is one catch however: eBay/picclick delivery prices. Most interesting keyboards will be international listings and will command a high price on the shipping alone. You can try and haggle down shipping costs but its unlikely that the average seller will comply.

Another site to try is Facebook marketplace. Items are usually dirt cheap and you don't have to rely on the weird listing policies that eBay enforces. But you will be expected to pick up the items from the seller directly so you might be trading shipping costs for travel costs. If you also just look up your area or region followed by listings or classifieds on google you may find a dedicated site to people selling off second hand items nearby.

You can also look up what ever given keyboard you are after (preferably by serial/manufacturer code) followed by for sale on google images. You may find some listings from store front websites after clicking some images and checking the related image sections of each. Almost all tech stores/repair places have a webpage and a catalogue of items they have in storage that you can contact and buy from. Because there are literally thousands of these I cant exactly give you pointers except for you to explore and find some for yourself via google images. Foreign web store fronts in particular will have old keyboards dirt cheap as keyboard collecting is not exactly a thing worldwide, I have seen Model F122's as low as $75 and Model Ms for far less.

Yahoo auctions are also pretty good, a few people I know in particular use the Japanese one. Availability however is extremely limited on what you can find, but if you can work around shipping the prices are usually quite low too.

[Muirium]

^ This.

Most of my most prestigious UnobtainIBM came via people in the electronics recycling industry. Cindy of Electronics Plus in Texas is legendary for a reason. She sourced me my beamspring, SSKs (including NIB), SGI, Zenith and many more besides. My Kishsaver was via Tinnie, who scored 20 or so from a recycling contact in Hong Kong. All the legendary keyboards wind up in recycling!

Buyee is a popular way to use Yahoo auctions in Japan. That’s the route for vintage Topre and other Japanese stuff, which doesn’t show up abroad.

And other than that? Trades here over eBay.

[fohat]

I scoured Goodwill, Salvation Army, secondhand components stores, random thrift shops, and couldn't find a model M

Thrift stores, in the US at least, have generally not been a viable source for vintage keyboards for at least a decade or more, for a couple of reasons.

First, if there is ANYBODY on the premises under the age of 80 they will have a laptop and will look up any "interesting" item over 20 years old on ebay to see if it is valuable or desirable. And they will know that a piece of peripheral computer gear that is not USB probably does not work with modern computers.

Second, (and this came from a regional manager of Goodwill of North Georgia a few years ago) the corporation itself felt pressure about both competition from legitimate new electronics sellers and also recycling concerns.

Lastly, most places probably feel that anything beige is simply so far out of style that nobody would want it.

[vyquad]

First ones i won an auction, second batch i got from a recycling center

[thefarside]

I think the recycling centers are catching on. The ones by me are listing their old computer parts on eBay or their own online store.

Another option would be flea markets, at least in the USA. I’ve also considered estate sales, but haven’t had the time.

Craigslist is also another way to find decent stuff. I bought a nearly new 1993 Model M from the original owner for $50. I’ll never forget the listing title: IBM Keyboard Best Ever

If you’re trying to buy in bulk search terms like “lot of“ and “liquidation” can return interesting results.

[Polecat]

I'm not a reseller, but I still find stuff fairly often at the thrift stores. I bought a nice Model M last year for $10 in a small town in east Texas. They might not see another one for a year, or ever.

It's a matter of patience and persistence. These are not commodity items; they're *collectibles*. You can't expect to go to one store one time and find a boatload of vintage keyboards just sitting there waiting for you to make a killing reselling them. If you make the rounds once a month you might find enough to pay your grocery bill for that week. Or maybe not.

[fohat]

go to one store one time and find a boatload of vintage keyboards

Having been in sales for 20+ years I have been dropping into various 2nd hand stores semi-regularly for a long time, and, even years ago, it was unusual to find a good keyboard there - and exceptionally rare to find 2 at the same time.

[Scarpia]

I had great luck with similar search terms to those mentioned above; also “keyboard PS2”, “keyboard AT” and “keyboard DIN”, in various languages to create search alerts on local European marketplaces (which is how I learned the word for keyboard in at least six languages).

That said, I have never had enough to resell, just enough for my own addiction