Quote:
Originally Posted by Electronic M
Most fridge models ARE much rarer than most regular ones. Either you you don't get out to enough radio rich places (like radio collector swap meets), or you are in a region where they did not sell well.  A brands presence in an a geographical area is proportional to their representation among local merchants, and their relative sales compared to other brands. Good case studies are Packard Bell, and Andrea brands. Packard Bell was a west coast brand, and they are very common in California and surrounding states, but once you get out towards the Midwest they are very rare to find in the wild (I've only ever seen two of their later offerings in person here, and none prior to the last 5 years). Andrea was an east coast brand IIRC and most of their offerings show up there. Even big national brands like Zenith and Philco have regions and pockets where they outsold all the other brands 10-1 or other brands outsold them by that amount.
Go to the big nationally attended radio swap meets like ARCI's Radiofest, MARC's Extravaganza, or Kutztown regularly for a few years if you want a good feel for what brands are out there and how common they are. |
I don't live near an area where there are Radio swap meets, and besides I can't drive outside a 50 Mile radius of where I live so no I don't and can't get out to Radio Swap meets. The only places I frequent are local antique shops and flea markets (and when Goodwill and Salvation Army used to carry vintage electronics those places as well) but the vintage and antique radio/TV market in my area has pretty much dried up since the DTV Transition (basically right after the DTV Transistion happened everyone in my area tossed their old TVs and or old Radios to the curb and the ones that were sensible enough to do so brought their old Radios and TVs to the local thrift stores like Goodwill or Salvation Army or even the locally owned Mennonite run Thriftstore in town) but then all of the aforementioned Thrift stores (except Salvation Army) stopped accepting electronics (except for the occasional clock radio which aren't neccesarrily vintage) so the only places left I can go to around where I live to find any vintage electronics are the local antique malls and flea markets and even then those places tend to over charge for their vintage or antique electronics if they do have any, case in point there is a local antique mall near me that has a booth in it that mostly specializes in primitives but they just so happen to have a late 1930s Philco Console Radio in their booth that is in absolutely horrible shape (the cabinet needs refinishing, its missing its preset buttons dial glass is missing, and speaker grill cloth is damaged) and they want $350 for the dumb thing which is way too much in my opinion for a radio in such ratty condition, there was even a booth in the same mall that had an early 1960s vintage stereophonic suitcase record player that wasn't even in that good of shape (the vinyl wrapping around the case was peeling off and the grill cloth on the speakers was soiled really badly and a few other issues with it) and he was wanting over $100 for it (which is also too much in my opinion.) So see where I live vintage and antique electronics are a scare comodity (I don't come across them very often and if i do they're either over priced or they're in horrible condition or both.) And even if I do come across anything its usually never brands like Crosley, or Philco, or Atwater Kent or Capehart, or anything like that. The only brands I've ever come across were usually Magnavox, Zenith, Arvin, Silvertone, RCA or GE, but even then they were usually the crappy models (either solid state or very late tube electronics never any of the early stuff.) The only exception to what I stated above was when I found at the same antique mall that had the aforementioned overpriced radios and record players I had found a 1937 Vintage Delco radio for $10 that was complete except for the cabinet was in horrible condition (it was water damaged and the veneer was peeling and chipped and the original cord was dry rotted) but even then that radio I had to give up on because the cabinet was too far gone to save and I didn't want to be holding onto a radio chassis that I might never find another cabinet for, so I just scrapped it out.