78 r.p.m. records to sell

Older_but_not_wiser_2

Hi there,

I've got over 100 old 78's I want to sell.
Looking through Record Collectors "Rare record guide price" book, they may be worth a few thousand pounds.

Where would it be best to sell these? To an independant record shop?

Anyone know the best way of going about this?

Ideally in the Glasgow area, but any advice is welcome.

Thanks.

tomvox

As someone who started to expand his record collection almost 50 years ago by buying up cheap 78's in The Barras and selling them on, I can tell you that sadly there are very few buyers for 78RPM discs these days. A look on eBay will show many hundreds for sale, the vast majortity of which attract no bids at all. That isn't to say that it's impossible to find buyers. You have wisely used the Record Collector Rare Record Price Guide to work out values. I hope you noted the importance of condition. In the 78RPM market it is almost impossible to find mint copies and the values go down very quickly as the condition falls. I would suggest that you advertise a few of them to start with in Record Collector (the monthly magazine that produces the price guide). There's still buyers looking for classic 50's Rock & Roll or Blues material so if that's what you have then you could be lucky. Don't forget that up to about 1958 78's vastly outsold 45's in this country and are therefore much more common. On the other hand a very few early 60's tracks were pressed on 78. Tracks like Cathy's Clown or Only The Lonely were number one hits but virtually impossible to find on UK 78's.

googler

The likelihood of finding a record shop that knows what a 78 is, never mind whether or not they'd want to buy them, is getting remoter by the day.

However, you may want to have a word with The Gramophone Emporium on St Stephen Street in Edinburgh. Google them for contact details, they certainly sell old 78s and may give you a price for the job lot.

It would help to have a list of titles for them first.

Generally speaking, what's in the collection?

Classical instrumental?
Classical vocal?
Jazz instrumental/vocal?
Rock n Roll / Doo Wop / Pop?