Looking at the polls so far I would say that the Founder’s collection is still marketable it just needs to be marketed differently.

There have been good ideas listed so far on what should be done. WickyWacky supports an inventory list so that Bill can properly and knowingly sells the founders collection. Bob and others have talked about a pallet at a time. These are such good ideas; we would have to ask why Bill didn’t think of it. Most likely Bill thought of it and probably about any other idea we can come up with. I am sure he wakes up many mornings thinking about what in the world am I going to do with those thousands of lighthouses. We all have had similar problems when you wake up to a beautiful morning and ready for a nice day and all of a sudden you remember your nagging problem that is there and won’t go away.

I feel that so far Bill has tackled this problem by cheapest quickest way first. Many of the senior collectors on these forums like Dave, Rich and yours truly have helped collectors sell their collections can relate in a small way of what Bill is going through. We help the seller with cleaning out the easy popular ones first and then tackling the very common lighthouses last. Some are even a waste of time to sell and giving them away or even disposing of them becomes the only option.

This very dilemma of having un-sellable lighthouses will eventually face Bill. Because of the economy and many other reasons there will come a point when the founders collection market becomes saturated. I personally don’t feel that Bill has reached that point yet but he has reached the point of no more easy sales. Using the last Founders collections and the poll as an example we would have to unanimously agree that Bill has to sell by lighthouse name or don’t sell at all.

Bill will have to make a decision on what route he will go. At this time if Bill wants to sell anymore founders collection he will have to identify the lighthouses for sale, by means of either an inventory or even just selling 50 at a time. If not he will be stuck with storage or eventually the dump.

The decision ahead of Bill is, should he put any more money into the selling of the founders and hope to get the money back or give up and destroy them all. In my personal opinion is that Bill will not take the easy way out but will utilize some of methods mentioned for selling.

Bill told me that for the second selling of the founder’s collection, He and a college kid located all the lighthouses to fill the orders. He said it was a lot of work and the person helping him made many mistakes. Probably one obviously mistake was giving Bob a #5 Heceta Head when he didn’t even ask for one.

Now for this go around of selling the founders collection, it sounds like Bill didn’t get as involved and hired someone to go to the Warehouse and grab the lights from the pile starting with the older lighthouse. This way the founders could still be offered with out all the headaches and Bill being involved. Since what Bill went thru this summer with health problems this was the best route to go.

Dave as usual has many good points about all the problems associated with selling anymore of the founder’s. The fact that Inventory should be done is a no-brainer but as Dave has said is there even room to lay out the lights? And then after they are inventoried, how are they stacked for easy access? Not counting the expense of the inventory. And because of the negative review for the past selling of the founders collection is it all worth it?

According to the Poll I did the Founders collection is still popular. It is the way it was just sold that was unpopular.
If us collectors just sit and wait around for the next Founders collection to come it may not happen. For the same reason that lighthouse lovers volunteer for lighthouse restorations is the same reason that collectors (Harbour Light Lovers) should support and volunteer if possible for saving the founders collection. It is important to us and we want to save as much of it as possible. The Selling of the founder’s collection may be considered a business but to us collectors it is considered a valuable part of HL history. Remember; “Once its gone it is really gone”.

This is what we need to do. Email Tony in your own words the following:

1. Thank Bill Younger and Harbour Lights for offering the founder’s collection.
2. Tell them you are still interested in purchasing from the founders collection again.
3. Would like if possible for collectors to purchase the founders by the Lighthouse name. An Alternate light would be acceptable.
4. Let them know if you would like to volunteer and if expenses would need to be paid or not.