Isn’t this taking the Marie Kondo urge just a bit too far? Delighted the proceeds are going toward a good cause.
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Good thing we live far away. My wife would kill me.
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A Heathkit Oscilloscope? Seriously? I hope it wasn't used for any mission-critical maintenance.
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Northwest Airlines used to sell old seats and other things at Ax-Man Surplus store on University Ave in St Paul.
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To each their own as beauty is always in the eye of the beholder.
Here in Colorado we make great outdoor furniture out of old decommissioned chairlifts from our numerous ski resorts.
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At last, legroom!
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And in the future every referendum can be repeated until the political elites (read hacks) get the result they want! What a concept!
This would be a cool way to decorate your apartment, or home. For example, you could purchase a row (or 2) of "passenger waiting seats" for your "entertainment room" or "man-cave"; which contains a large screen TX for the "Ultimate Theatrical Look". They would definitely be better than "chewing gum encrusted" seats from an old theater.
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Back in the 1970s when the Italian Line (passenger ships) closed its New York offices, the staff dumped boxes of photos and other items that collectors will now practically draw switchblades on each other to get. A guy who worked for them and rescued much of it is sitting on a mint. I'm sure you can imagine the prices such prosaic items as water jugs and soup tureens from any class on White Star Line ships command nowadays - and those prices are not paid by middle-aged eccentrics in sweatpants. The eventual value of the contemporary airline stuff written about here is anybody's guess as that will depend on how much of it gets thrown away and what new form of transportation horror makes people nostalgic for the jets we complain about today.
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People must be really bored to purchase old airline junk. Then again some people buy junk everyday why else would there be so many goodwill and consignment shops on almost every corner in Northwest Florida.
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There are so many 2nd-hand shops and charity shops in Florida because people move down there to retire, and after their deaths their furniture and other stuff lands in the shops. Florida is a trash basket or recycling bin for the east coast.
I’d guess the number of current employees or customers that would attend an American Airlines logo product sale is about zero.
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How about buying leftover Delta food? It's probably fresher than what they serve on their aircrafts.
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I wonder if I could purchase two first class seats for $300 and just use them when I fly. No thanks, I don’t need a seat assignment, I brought my own...
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There's a thriving market in transportation collectibles, especially old railroad items known by collectors as railroadiana. Prices on some old RR china or silver pieces can run hundreds of dollars, or even thousands, per item. Ditto for old RR locks, lanterns, engine number boards, bells, whistles, tools, paper items, etc.
There is a lesser market for steamship, airline, bus and trucking memorabilia and there are collectors for many other types of items like breweriana, medical devices, etc.
Like the art world, there are also fakes out there to beware of.
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Arghhh.... what would Marie Kondo say about these acquisitions?!
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You people are going to regret this. It's your kids who'll have to get rid of the accumulated junk. You'll sit there, in the final days of your life, looking around and wondering what made you do it.
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@Les,
If they're getting my inheritance they can darn well clean out what they consider accumulated junk.
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It's one thing to collect items from a long gone airline like Braniff but aside from the test equipment, which is probably not worth repairing, these items will never hold any monetary value. The old Braniff stuff is pretty much valueless except to remind us ex employees that they still owe us our last paycheck.
As a aside did you know that the employees are last in line for retribution and that unpaid wages are not tax deductible?
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Those airline casserole rectangular dishes are virtually indestructible. I had one Canadian airlines business class dish and bought three more on ebay when I saw them, Noritake Japan was the manufacturer. They great for heating single meals in the oven. Given the life cycle of an airline casserole dish, from kitchen to catering truck, galley oven, and passenger tray these dishes are durable - I can attest to that.
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The galley cart has a multitude of uses in the home. It is a great pickup at one of these sales.
Steve
www.travelingprofessor.com
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@TravelingProfessor
Also an opportunity for cold, hard cash. A relative of mine bought maybe half-a-dozen (possibly on eBay or Craigslist), cleaned them up, and re-sold them (also probably on eBay or CraigsList) at a profit.
Furloughed Federal employees, consider this as an opportunity.
Bravo to Delta for doing this bit to “ Reduce, Reuse, Recycle”.
When I flew in December, I read something else Delta does to avoid unnecessary landfill waste.
“When 64,000 Delta employees in Airport Customer Service, Cargo, In-flight Service and TechOps headed to work in their new uniforms on May 29, over 1 million pieces of their old uniform were retired. To prevent those uniforms from ending up in landfills, more than 350,000 pounds of clothing have been donated to be upcycled and repurposed by Delta’s partner, Looptworks.”
It is one of the largest single “company textile diversion programs in U.S. history, where no items or to landfills or incineration.”
Some pretty cool purses, bags and other items now are being created from those old uniforms.
Turns out Looptworks also sells to the public redesigned items that recycle from Southwest Airlines, Alaska Airlines and others, too. Everything sold online.
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@Jean
It is an outstanding move made by Delta, and an obvious model for other companies in a similar situation.
BTW, Delta Airlines was founded in 1928 in Monroe, Louisiana by C.E. Woolman (a pilot) who got several backers to help him buy a former crop-dusting company. It was originally named "Delta Air Service", because of the region it served. Monroe is located in NE Louisiana. They have a cool exhibit there, which tells you all about it.
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I was a client of an auction house and received the catalog when the Concorde's were broken up and sold. You couldn't buy a plane but they sold the intact complete restrooms, for people who wanted to join the mile high club at sea level I guess? You could have bought engines, uniforms, dining ware. Way more interesting but I also thought, what the heck are you going to do with all that junk?!
One man's trash....
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Why oh why, am I not surprised that the overwhelming majority of buyers at this event are middle-aged guys? As my remarkably forbearing wife often says, "It's the transportation gene."
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@Mark F. I've been selling some silverplate tableware from the Pacific Steamship Company, which plied the waters of the West Coast, Hawaii, and the South Pacific in the first 30 years of the 20th century. The buyers have been exclusively male.