TVmusic Fairs was set up by punk rock enthusiast Nick Duckett, whoheld his first fair in Reading simply to try and expand his own record collection by bringing together collectors and record dealers under one roof to buy, sell and exchange their own discs. TVmusic record fairs are now held in Reading, Southampton, Bristol, Oxford, London and Portsmouth.
25 Years later TV Fairs has remained the longest standing music fairs organisation in the country. No, it's not the St Mary's jumble sale, nor is it a car boot sale with Cockney wide-boys peddling the gear they filched from down the Old Kent Road last Friday night. It's more like a giant market of CDs, Vinyl, Cassettes, DVDs, Videos and Memorabilia. There's also arange of accessories on sale such as CD cases, plastic LP sleeves and the like.
Nowadays you'll find a regular show in almost every large town in the UK, attended by hundreds, even thousands of people. People visit these events, week in week out, knowing that they can find a wider range of music products at much lower prices than in the high street chains. The fairs typically open to the public at around 10 o'clock, and run till four in the afternoon. Once seen as the haunt of the enthusiast minority, they have undergone something of a transformationin recent years as more and more users see them as a viable alternative to shopping in the high street.Fair goers seem to enjoy the events socially and often visit with friends for a day out. You can even leave the children at the pool in Reading and Portsmouth. It's not uncommon for enthusiasts to attend a show every weekend.
Why should anyone want to visit one of these music fairs? Well the reasons are two-fold - price and choice. Prices in the high street may be tumbling by the day, but the music Fairs dealers' low overheads allow them to significantly undercut the major chains on brand newchart and back catalogue CDs by as much as 50%.The majority of traders rely exclusively on fairs, thus escaping the costs of fitting out shops in prime high-street locations, which means that dealers can afford to shave prices to the bone. To a stallholder, a fair combines the cheapness of running a mail order operation with the volume sales of a busy highstreet. You can even spy traders marking their stock downwhilst they trade, after noticing what their neighbours are knocking stuff out at.
How do the traders manage to maintain such low prices if it's all legitimate stuff? Well the answer to that is that the traders put in an awful lot of hard graft travelling all over the country during the week to track down suppliers with overstocks, distributors in far-flung parts of the country who find they just can't shift the stuff that's selling so well on the streets of London or Bristol.
Then there's the radio stations and Record Company reps who offload the mountain of excess freebieson to their friendly local music fair trader. Many of the Cds on offer may be bought direct from the factory as some traders have an arrangement with the manufacturer.
If it's choice you're after, then Music Fairs win hands down. They are held on weekends and bank holidays in huge municipal buildings such as Town Halls, Guildhalls, massive Sports Halls, or in hotel conference centres. The size of a dealer's stall is approximately 6 foot wide, so just imagine anything between 50 and 200 of these stalls all under one roof and you get some idea of the scale of things.
Absolutely anything from the last 50 years of music is likely to be on sale. What about the choice? If you're looking for bargains, the best thing to do is to take a good look around first to check the prices. If you're after rarities then your tactics will have to be different. Some collectors won't leave the house without an exact list of everything they need, with maximum prices they're prepared to pay, and they then spend the day thrusting their little piece of A4 into the palms of any trader who's prepared to save them the trouble of flicking through the racks to see what they've got.
Some of the stallholders appear to have almost photographic memories, being able to find one long-buried Monkees single from 1967 in seconds from a box containing several thousand 45s. Others prefer to silently plough their way through racks and racks of LPs, hoping to find that one incredible bargain for 50p that they've been looking for since they were 16 years old.
On trade stands at the fairs you will find friendly, approachable and well established companies and also individuals who are just out to improve on their own collections. You'll find the average trader at a computer fair has made a carreer out of music. They can provide you with a wealth of knowledge and advice, coupled with exceptional service and of course the bargain prices that bring you to these fairs. One thing you won't find here are the kind of young and inexperienced sales people that retail outlets usually employ.
There is a curious mixture of two completely different types of stallholder. On the one hand, there is the collectors-enthusiast-type with their Tamla Motown records, their rockabilly, or their grunge vinyl artifacts. On the other hand, there is the professional trader selling the very latest brand new CDs and quite happy to accept Visa cards or any other manner of payment for that matter. Some stallholders will specialise in one product, for example, selling Jazz LPs from the 1950s, or CD singles from the 1990s. Others will stock anything and everything at just one price.
Haggling is encouraged, but you will get better results near the end of the show when the trader just wants to go home, so more items sold means less to carry. The end of the show is also a good time for a process known as minesweeping - where the traders have some time to rush around and mop up what's left. Consider the alternative - over zealous salespeople, overcrowding, long queues and often a limited choice in your local high street music store - you can hardly blame the growing number of users who shop at music fairs.
And once you're through haggling, there's always a pub or restaurant virtually within arm's reach or, in some cases, inside the hall itself. Above all, music fairs are fun and friendly, and you're sure to save some money. People have an understandable fear of buying untried goods off a bloke at a trestle table in a hall. After all, you know HMV is still going to be there in the high street on Monday if your Frank Black promo turns out to be Cilla Black live at the Talk of the Town. The bloke at the show, meanwhile, might now be at the other end of the country. On this score you have no worries.
TV Music Fairs have been going now since 1979 and they have developed a policy whereby faulty goods will be either replaced or refunded automatically as long as you can remember which dealer you bought the offending item from.
As a rule of thumb, we only end up having to replace 3 or 4 items every year, so naturally we are pleased about the level of satisfaction that this implies. Due to the mobile nature of record and CD fairs, one might think they are an ideal place for the fly-by-night rogue trader, and one of the first questions people ask is whether anything offered for sale is "dodgy" or stolen.
This is actually quite unusual since the organisers take great care to screen out bad dealers, as it reflects on their ability to get customers through the door. Normal Sale of Goods legislation applies so that stallholders come under exactly the same trading standards as high street stores.
One thing that is absolutely forbidden is the sale of pirated CDs or privately recorded CD ROMs that seem to be so popular on the street markets. If we do get a dodgy dealer, they are immediately banned from operating at the shows.
Word of mouth ensures that these tricksters are stopped from moving on to any of the other UK fairs. Organisers occasionally carry out random checks to make sure a trader is still in business and operating at the same address. On the whole though, most traders have been providing a reputable service at the same stand for some years and are well-known in the industry.
TV Music Fairs does not buy or sell goods. However, stallholders at all the events welcome members of the public who wish to dispose of their collections. You may either bring your goods along to the fair on the day, and sell to the dealers there and then, or alternatively you can come along and find out from the organiser who would be most likely to buy your collection, and invite them to visit you at your home.
If you are a collector who just wants to sell a few things from your own collection, you can also hire a 6 foot table at the fair for just 20 pounds,but don't forget to make sure that all your stock is correctly priced.
If you have any worries about travelling a long way for a fair only to find it cancelled, then have no fear. In our 25 years of trading we have NEVER cancelled an advertised fair. Fairs are usually held monthly. Just ask the organiser when the next one will be or check on this website or in the monthly Record Collector magazine which is available at WHSmith.
1. To ensure that you don't travel long distances for nothing, TV Fairs will refund your travel expenses if we don't have our minimum stated number of stalls at any of our advertised events.
2. Although TVmusic Fairs do not buy or sell goods, we offer an unconditional money back guarantee on anything which is faulty or sold in error. Customers can simply bring the item back to the next fair and we will reimburse you.
Retailing is seasonal, and you will find that some months are busier than others. As a general rule, winter is more profitable for traders than summer. Therefore TV Music Fairs taking place in the winter months will generally be full to maximum capacity whereas in the summer the fairs are likely to be less well attended. Taking this fact into account fairs in June, July and August will have approximately 15% fewer dealers present than other months. The table on the right shows the approximate number of stalls at our fairs. Please expect to find the minimum stated number of stalls in the Summer and Christmas periods. At all other times stalls will be nearer the maximum stated level. Number of stalls at fairs TOWN VENUE MIN MAX Oxford Southampton Jury's Hotel Temple Meads The Town Hall The Pyramids Sundays Bank Holidays Main Hall