The First Cut's the Deepest

Since I opened my Booth at the Antique Mall selling records in March, I've been rather fortunate. Sales have been great, and the overall feeling was the Mall employees respected my inclusion to their "team". Besides the first week, when 2 of my 6 Fake Gold Beatles records "vanished," I had no issues whatsoever.

Until yesterday.

I was told by the management when I opened the booth that, as with any business, they had troubles sometimes with tag switching. So, with their direction, I took ALL the recommended steps to ensure that wouldn't happen. I came up with my own policies.

1. EVERY record was to have: Booth Number, Price, Artist Name, Record Name, AND Inventory number.
2. EVERY record $5 and above would be placed in a plastic sleeve with the tag on the sleeve, and the booth number also written in pencil on the inside cover of the record.
3. All records under $5 would have a sticker placed directly on the cover.
4. EVERY piece of inventory would be logged into a database, so I know what's out there, the price, and when I took it out there and sold it.

I noticed Wednesday night as I checked my sales that 5 records had sold for $1 a piece, which is odd, since most of my stuff is priced $2 and up. The second red flag was the fact that no inventory numbers were logged in, a practice the Mall is pretty good about keeping up on. I quickly looked at the title description the Mall had typed in, and my fears were finally realized.

Three of the records were suppose to be $5 each, one was $8, and the fifth was $20. $43 worth of records, sold for $5. CRAP! After a stressful night's sleep, I travelled to the Mall and arrived as they opened the doors.

I had planned on trying to find the empty sleeves to show the original prices, but I had no luck. As I searched, I did find a SIXTH price switch...a $3 Chuck Berry record that I THOUGHT had sold was sitting on the shelf in a plastic sleeve that was reserved for a $30 Chuck Berry record. The $30 record was gone.

Now my loses were at $65.

I approached the manager, and told him what had happened. He seemed as distraught as I was. He quickly accommodated my every whim, pulling sales receipts to see WHO sold the records, IF they buyer paid by credit card so he could be tracked, etc. Cash was used, eliminating the potential to know the scammer, but the employee was working who sold 3 of the 5 records. She remembered the transaction, as it was with a notorious "suspected" tag switcher, nicknamed "Combover Guy."

"It was Combover Guy, I know it was," she said with preciseness. The manager muttered a curse, as he knew Combover Guy was in the store, and he knew he should have been watching him, but neglected to do so. It had been weeks since he had tried anything, so they loosened the reigns a little on him. Since he had never been caught in the act, they couldn't really do anything about him, but they knew WHO he was, and they made sure, usually, to follow him around.

We focused on the 5 $1 records first, trying to figure out how this could have happened. We determined that he came in, slipped the plastic sleeve off 3 of the record, placed a tag that he made on the records, stashed the sleeve, and bought them. Then he went to his car, came BACK in, and did the same to 2 additional records using a second cashier.

The Sixth record was completely the fault of the cashier. The scammer peeled the price sticker from a $3 Chuck Berry record called "Golden Hits" and placed it on the cover of the $30 Chuck Berry record called "Berry On Top." The plastic sleeve was then placed over the $3 record. The cashier saw Chuck Berry and that was good enough for them...the TITLE of the record went totally ignored. A safe guard that should have prevented the sale, was overlooked.

"Why am I wasting my time writing this information if it's not even going to be looked at?" I asked.

"It will be looked at now." the manager relied.

Little consolation.

Once we knew the problem, the Police were called so a Police report could be filed. I really appreciated the extra effort by management to make sure the problem was noted. They also went the extra mile to ensure it wouldn't happen again by getting permission to call the police to "tail" Combover Guy should he come in again, and they even got the go ahead to tell Combover he had to leave the store on grounds of trespassing (suspicion of tag switching) if they deemed fit. A few other safeguards that I would rather not disclose were also put into place.

A follow up call is forthcoming, to fill me in on all the details. I'll let you know.

Of course, this isn't just $65 in loss. It's loss for me and loss for my friend who consigned the records to me (as they were his records that were hit). Now I have to break the news to him, risking him pulling his stuff, which looses me MORE money. Not to mention that nagging in the back of my head to not take the really good stuff out there anymore, for fear it will get switched...again, this looses me money (and the Mall.)

Since I've sold so much out there, I am hopeful it is an isolated incident, and it won't happen again. Especially with the safeguards that have been added, but it still frustrates me. Haven't found out yet what kind of reparations I might be entitled to, if any. More than likely nothing for the 5, since they probably had legit tags on them, but that $30 Berry record I'll fight over! No way that should have went through!