Swap meets

I have just gotten back from Carlisle. Still a great swap meet. I also met with Lime Rock when I was up that way and they are actively rekindling the Labor Day weekend swap meet as part of their vintage event. We also have started to develop a swap meet as part of the Mitty weekend.

We should write a story on what swap meets are left, where and when they are and what type of stuff can be found.

Who knows of any sporty car type swap meets? Where, when, and how good are they?

I can do more digging on this if needed, but here are the basics:

1) Pomona Swap & Show. Held every other month @ Pomona Fairgrounds in LA. There are two sections; Porsche/VW and American. Been there for 20+ years. The import stuff is there, but buried. TONS of American stuff. Hard to see it all.

2) All Porsche Swap (I think that's what it's called). Affectionately known locally as "Used to be Dunkel's." Held the same weekend as the Porsche literature & toy show. In Los Angeles.

3) Ventura Porsche Show & Swap. Used to be German Auto Fest. Ventura CA. Held in the fall if I recall correctly at the Ventura Cty Fairgrounds.

4) iPD Swap meet. Volvo stuff. I think it was just this past weekend. Here's a link to a thread over on TB:

http://forums.turbobricks.com/showthread.php?t=170534

Tim Suddard wrote: I have just gotten back from Carlisle. Still a great swap meet.

Come on, Tim. You were there during the glory years. Import Carlisle is merely a shadow of it's once great self and the folks who run it are doing nothing I can see to nurse it back to health. I spoke with two vendors myself who were so disgusted they vowed not to return next year, and these are guys who have been coming nearly as long as I have.

If you have an American car, spring and fall Carlisle are great. So is the AACA show at Hershey, but it's mostly pre-1960s American. If you have a Porsche, there is a excellent swap meet in Hershey I think in April (not owning a Porsche makes the date not-so-relevent).

Webster Florida first sunday of the month is pretty good . Car swap and show and Flea market . http://www.websterfleamarket.net/

Im glad Im not the only one that was disappointed in the Carlisle show. It was my first big time swap meet. I was really excited...Like Christmas, only to find no Red Ryder under the tree

I've never been to Carlisle so I can't comment on the quality of that venue now vs. the old days. But I've been going to Lime Rock's Fall Vintage Festival on Labor Day weekends every year for a long, long time and the overall quality of the swap meet has deteriorated tremendously over the past 5 years or so to the point where about all that was being peddled were old Road & Track magazines and rusty tin toys (easy to haul) ... practically no car parts of any interest or value, and definitely no complete cars. (Around 8-10 years ago I remember seeing an unmolested Jabro body and space frame for sale!) I'd love to see the swap meet make a comeback at Lime Rock, but I don't know if the deteriorating scene has anything to do with lack of promotion. It's probably more about lack of initiative on the part of sellers. Do you realy want to haul a trailerload of parts a couple hundred miles just to set them up as a museum display for a limited customer base and then haul most of them home again? It's a lot easier to sell obscure, greasy car parts to a much broader customer base online these days.

I have been going to Carlisle since 1990. I was very surprised that from last year to this year the lack of Vendors. I would say it was about 1/3 of what it was in the hay-day and twice as many kit-cars. I would go and spend 3 days of rummaging through piles of cars and lost treasures. This year was about a 45 minute walk around and my biggest purchase was lunch. I spent more time with friends that came down from Massachusetts at the Hotel. If it wasn’t an hour and twenty minute from my house I would completely skip the event. Lets see what 2010 brings…….

I think some of you guys are missing the point I 'think' Tim is trying to make... constantly putting down the show in a public forum such as this will only make it worse, not better. It becomes a self-fufilling prophecy.

I talked with one of the organizers about the vendor issue and they are well aware of it. However, they are not sure what to do about it. I don't have any answers either. Do you? Just sitting here bitching about it will accomplish nothing.

If I had more money, there were TONS of things I would have bought... the biggest that comes to mind was a mint, NOS GT6 MkIII bonnet for a paltry $650... which I could have really used for my Spit 6... I was still able to find a few more affordable bits I needed, such as a repalcement license plate lamp lens and battery hold-down parts.

Next year, I hope to have more money to spend.

Actually, I wasn't moaning about the condition of the Lime Rock swap meet. I believe the days of big swap meets are waning, or maybe even over. With online commercial services like eBay, Craigslist, enthusiast boards, etc. it's a lot easier in modern times to sell car parts that way than to haul a trailerload of parts to a swap meet and hope somebody buys something. I don't think it's about promoting the event better. I don't think it's about a lack of potential buyers somewhere in the world. I do think it's more about the ease of selling online compared to in a muddy field.

You guys might want to consider the ~Englishtown Swap Meet~ here in NJ.

It's a bit too "hot roddy" for me, but lots of interesting stuff, none the less.

Ian F wrote: I talked with one of the organizers about the vendor issue and they are well aware of it. However, they are not sure what to do about it. I don't have any answers either. Do you? Just sitting here bitching about it will accomplish nothing.

How about we start with lowering the prices to make it more appealing to everyone? I didn't bother to take my car for the show field because the price is simply too high. I quit being a vendor years ago because the cost of a tiny piece of grass had kept going UP while attendance began going DOWN. The giveaway cars that used to entice people to stay through Sunday have become so pedestrian and awful nobody really wants to win them. Promotion of the event has dropped off considerably in the last several years. Have the people in charge talked to the swap meet vendors and asked them for their opinions? Not that I've ever heard.

My impression, having been both a vendor and show participant, is that Carlisle's management is indifferent at best. They live on the fruits of their much larger events and don't seem to take the Import show seriously enough to realize it is a unique beast that needs to be handled differently. Blaming the internet for it's dwindling participation is only a percentage of the story. I have not seen the Spring or Fall meets falling off with vendors. People aren't dumping old imported cars for Camaros and Mustangs.

I "complain" about it publicly in the hopes it may finally cross their radar screen that people are displeased with this show in it's current form. I've stated my gripes to them personally in the past but have mostly received excuses about how much it costs to put on the show and how the internet is stealing their thunder. If we just sit around stewing about how it sucks compared to 10 years ago privately nothing will change.

Maybe if the folks at CMS feel strongly about the viability of a major event they can do the marketing research and sponsor one. Tim?

Ian F wrote: I talked with one of the organizers about the vendor issue and they are well aware of it. However, they are not sure what to do about it. I don't have any answers either. Do you? Just sitting here bitching about it will accomplish nothing.

Some of us have spoken with Carlisle for years running. Some of us remember when one of them popped up here a few years ago. Carlisle management doesn't give a tinkers darn what you think, or I think. They care about what they think only. They've made that abundently clear, over and over again.

As d said, lower the prices to be a vendor. That's a big start. Make it clearer how an individual can set up and sell (it's almost impossible to figure out, try it and see). Advertise.

http://www.floridaswapmeet.com/putnam/Default.aspx wE did some sign work for this guy that works the show and he said the sprockets flea was pretty good , never been there but figured to pass the word . there is also a car flea date also .