I am trying to identify my mother's tea set. She has 10 sets of cups, saucers, and plates plus a tea pot and sugar bowl (no creamer has been found). The pictures identify it as being made in Bavaria, Western Germany.
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I think this is the Vintage Oscar Schaller Winterling Rosebud pattern.
If you are asking to value it, post back and I can help.
Thank you so much for getting back to me so quickly. Yes, a valuation would be very useful.
Absolutely!!
Based on my findings, I would start asking about $250 for the set, and take best offer, which I can almost guarantee you will be as low as $40-50 if you sell it on your own.
Please don't shoot the messenger here...I say this because the market for fine china is at its lowest ever and most people want nothing to do with it.
How I value things is a variety of ways--first I look on eBay for solds. There I found the saucers selling for 1.00 each plus shipping (they typically are sold in lots of 4-8 so 4.00 for 4, plus shipping. That values them at about 2.00 each (which is the asking price plus a percentage of shipping).
There are no examples of sold cups on eBay, so for that I went to Replacements.com to see how much they sell sets for.
They sell a cup and saucer SET for 11.99 each--so about half for each so 6.00 (rounded up).
Replacements is a great site, but they charge 8 times what a person gets for the same item on eBay.
To price the pot, I did not find any SOLD on eBay. The pot, by the way, I think it technically is a coffee pot not a tea pot, but I could be wrong since replacements does not have the image of it on their site. Here is the link www.replacements.com/
Why I say this is I was always taught the phrase "tea pot, short and squat" and the other is the coffee pot.
Since there are none for sale or sold on eBay, I checked ETSY and Chairish and the sellers there up to $200 for the pot. ASKING, NOT SOLD...sellers can ASK what they want, I can almost guarantee you they will NOT get that amount. Truthfully, they will be lucky to get $25 based on the market.
The same with the sugar bowl and creamers. There are NONE sold anywhere and sellers are asking $10-20 for the sugar bowl and creamer. They may get $5-10 for them.
If you are comfortable wrapping and shipping and want one stop shopping, you can contact Replacements.com and see if they are buying the pieces.
If they are, they will give a price they pay for each piece. From my recent experience, they will quote you a price that is about 1/8 of retail (so if they sell for 11.99, they will give you approx 1.50).
They used to offer a higher percentage, but I noticed as the market gets worse (high supply, LOW demand) they dropped from about 1/4 of retail down to offering about 1/8).
SAD!
They have very explicit instructions for how to package things you sell to them. Follow everything to the letter, and when they get the items, they review and send a check in 3-4 weeks.
I have had very good experiences selling to them, although the last time I approached them, they were not buying what I had to sell, which was disappointing. The message was the market is saturated at the moment, try again. I just have not been able to do that.
The other alternatives to sell are eBay, an in person venue, like a consignment store, or Facebook Marketplace.
Unless you are an eBay sales person already (meaning comfortable selling on eBay and have some sales under your belt), I DO NOT recommend trying to sell the dishes there.
Dishes are very hard to sell because buyers are very picky and your good condition may be their poor.
PLUS the items are very fragile and unless packaged very well (double boxed, oodles of bubble wrap, and packing peanuts, they often arrive broken and it is a nightmare.
I AM a very experienced eBay seller and I no longer sell dishes on the site for this reason.
What I do recommend is to find a good consignment store and have them sell them for you. They will decide if they want to sell as a set or by the piece (personally, I prefer by the piece, but that is just me).
They will split the profits with you. You get the items out of the house, and a check when the items sell. I have been very pleased with this method for my own sales. I have done this when Replacements didn't offer enough for what I was selling.
If you don't want to split the profits with anyone, and are OK with all it entails, you can try selling them through Facebook Marketplace in one of your local to your town groups...mine are called SWOT (Sale Want or Trade) groups, some are called (TOWN NAME) Flea Market Group...every town is different so if you have not gone this route and don't know to find a group, shoot me the name of your city and state and I will see if I can find a few good groups for you to join.
Be aware when you do this, people will want to meet you somewhere to get the items or you can do a porch pick up. I have done both and prefer porch picks, but they don't work for everyone. I also would NOT do a porch pick up when I am asking more than $25.00 for an item.
No matter what, SAFETY first when selling through an IN PERSON venue like Facebook.
If you meet someone, meet at a public place, like a grocery store lobby or best yet, a police or fire station (SOME EVEN HAVE FACEBOOK MEET UP LOCATIONS ON CAMERA 24/7) and NEVER go alone.
I can offer other selling suggestions if you need them. I hope this helps get you started!
Thank you for a ton of great advice. You are quite right that the pot is a coffee pot. My plan had been to give the entire set to a church run local thrift shop and let them decide how best to maximize their earnings. I will certainly pass your comments along to them. Thanks again for your help.
So happy I could help. I hope the church does well with them. That is a lovely way to give them a new life!! Thanks for asking!
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