The perils of giving stuff away...

[GILow]

Aaargh! All this good advice AFTER the event.

Thanks to all for the sympathy and shared experiences, sort of good to know I am not alone with this one.

Matt

[S/V Alchemy]

Originally Posted by boden36

If you give something for free, people won't value it and as you have found will stuff you around. Put a price on it, and give the proceeds to your favourite charity.
Regards,
Richard

Done in one. Part of my living is in the field of marketing. If you want to make certain items more appealing, raise the price. It's the Apple method. A free little kid's catamaran is by definition and sight unseen worthless. At $100, it's a "steal".

Charge $100, move the boat in a day, and buy some poor kids some Christmas presents.

[monte]

just curious, what is it.. Arafura Cadet..Elwood jnr?

[GILow]

Originally Posted by monte

just curious, what is it.. Arafura Cadet..Elwood jnr?

Actually, I don't really know. There is an embossed logo saying "Quickcat" on the rudders, but that might be a generic rudder component.

Here's a picture.

[monte]

haha wow! yeah not a quick cat, I dont know what it is, pretty funny looking though !

[Wotname]

Cat designer Lindsay Cunninghham design a small cat back in the 50's or 60's called a "quickcat"; IIRC, they were plywood and usually homebuilt but perhaps later also manufactured in fibreglass. Not sure if he ever designed a 9 fter though???

[GILow]

Whatever it is, there's another just like it for sale on Gumtree at the moment, so it wasn't a one-off.

Anyway, I have a pretty genuine sounding guy coming to collect it on Saturday. Fingers crossed that this one is not another of the rude-brigade.

Matt

[ausaviator]

Gumtree (owned by Ebay for those that didn't know) seems to attract the scum of the earth in Melbourne at least.

I put my old racing bike on it for $150. It was there for 30 seconds and a guy rang me saying that he wanted it for his son who was the perfect size for it. He came and got it straight away. Next thing I was advised it was on Ebay for $800 with a cocked up story about how he had owned it for over 5 years or some crap. He lied about even having a kid and he simply buys and sells bikes on the Internet to make money. He still cant get rid of it even at $150 ;-)

Others at my work have also had interesting experiences on Gumtree. One guy came all the way across Melbourne on the train to buy a boxing bag that weighed 40kg's and then he put it across his shoulders and walked 4km to the nearest train station.

I'm sure that there are lots of other stories and I'm not surprised that you are having some issues!

[bobconnie]

Down the bayou, if ya want to get rid of something just put it out front and put a sigh on it saying Don't take !! It will be gone overnight everytime!! Just a thought! LOL

[GILow]

Originally Posted by ausaviator

I put my old racing bike on it for $150. It was there for 30 seconds and a guy rang me saying that he wanted it for his son who was the perfect size for it. He came and got it straight away. Next thing I was advised it was on Ebay for $800 with a cocked up story about how he had owned it for over 5 years or some crap. He lied about even having a kid and he simply buys and sells bikes on the Internet to make money. He still cant get rid of it even at $150 ;-)

Kind of like a businessman equivilent of the C.M.T Dibbler character from the Terry Pratchett Discworld series.

[GILow]

Just had to add the final chapter to the saga.

The guy who sounded genuine earlier in the week turned up today, as he said he would. He was, of course, 1 and half hours late.

He turned up in a sort of crew cab SUV with a four foot long tray, to collect a 9 foot long catamaran with a 16 foot mast. No roof racks, no rope, just two old towels and a roll of ducting tape. Wife and three kids in the car too.

I couldn't watch, I left him to load it without me because, as I said to him, he was supposed to have a trailer and rope. I had specifically suggested that to him. I hope he made it home safely, he had nearly an hour's drive ahead of him.