+1

I wouldn't pay 25% of the price on DE pins, since JP is in resto-progress.

Add in 30-36% duty.
Add in customs fee.
Add in brokerage fee.
Add in storage fee at dock before clearing customs.
Add in rail freight from East Coast to wherever.
Add in freight from rail yard to wherever you want the container delivered.
Add in rental fee for container until you are done with it.

Are you allowed to try the games out before you buy?

Forget it, we need to kill this thread! Yikes!

I'd really like to hear if anyone has actually done anything close to this before.

I guess if we don't hear otherwise, we'll have to assume not.

Tony. I know someone who has done it. 40 by himself. He wouldn't do it again. I own one of those 40. Although, the SS and NBAFB look interesting to me.

i would be in for a west coast buy. what if we could get 8 people to buy 4 machines each it would work. out of the 4 you get 1 "A" list title and you have to take atleast 1 data east/gottlieb.

Yikes!!

I'm starting to get the feeling that this deal won't quite be worth it...

8 x 4 = 32

I think the listing says that they can fit up to 36. So, 9 might be an easier number.

I think your idea makes perfect sense though.

I sent you a PM tony.

Be careful guys. I have heard many, many horror stories about container buys. Hidden costs, beaten games, missing parts, flooding and rust risks from weeks/months on the water, huge customs headaches, shady dealers, etc, etc, etc. It is almost guaranteed that you will not get many if any nice games...some might be decent at best if you are lucky. Even the few guys I've heard of that ended up coming out ahead in the end wouldn't do it again. Just too many headaches and risks.

Remember the old saying...if it sounds too good to be true...

I personally wouldn't touch one of these "deals" with a 100 foot pole.

how about a 200-foot pole?

in reality, I'm not going to get my hopes too high. Additionally, I don't think I've got enough local friends in the hobby that would be interested in order to make it worth it.

Now, if there were someone on the coast that was really excited about it ....

LOL...my first thought was "I wouldn't "do" her with your "unit" ", but thought that was a little tilt-worthy even in the censored form...

I think some of you guys have no idea how badly worn some of these machines can be. Water damage, rust, playfield wear, cabinet fade (9 times out of 10), missing parts, etc. The "beat" machines that are criticized for sale here would be above average for a container load.

I went in on a container load about 8 years ago, and I don't think I would try it again. Not to mention, the cost now is higher and it seems the selection is worse.

EDIT: Most of the machines I received from the container were sold to operators who could still make money on them. No way would most collectors have approved of their condition.

The only way to make it work would be to send someone to Italy to inspect the pins and supervise loading.

Uhh... I'll go. I won't even take a pin. Just build in a plane ticket to the split

Not pinball games, but I have imported container loads of antique furniture.

=

Before you even think about something like this, you have to become familiar with the term Ocean Container:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Containerization

Never really seen a pinball machine with water damage or rust. Except for rust on the legs. This may sound stupid but how would a machine get water damage?

Of course these aren't collector quality machines but you don't think they could be shopped and then resold?

The problem is, CC is an $11K game, SS is a $3.5K game.

Holy freaking God look at those pins!

pzy said:
The only way to make it work would be to send someone to Italy to inspect the pins

that's what i said

I assure you most of those machines will need more than a shop job if you want to make a profit on them.

Water and untreated wood do not mix. Often these overseas machines have had water exposure while at docks, in storage, transportation, etc. I've seen saggy cabinet bottoms, swelled and soft cabinet wood, wrinkled cabinet art, etc.

You could get very lucky and have some decent machines. But many here would have to use their imagination to picture how bad some of these machines could be.

If i had the money to risk on this, i'd just buy a route beater and send it to a high end restorer. Far less risk involved and you'll get something nice. You get what you pay for.

what they dont have like 10 mm plenty of ss and totan but no mm
but back to the topic seems like its way to good to be true !!!!

Would you need a lawyer to do a deal like this? I was looking at that Portugal deal earlier in the year and apparently someone bought it. If there is someone with experience in this and wants to go in on this deal I can get to Italy at the end of June to take pictures and inspect (I can go in on half). I'm sure there is also some room to negotiate on the price and the selection of pins.

Consider me in on the deal if you end up spear heading this deal. I am in Sacramento which is local(ish) for a deal like this

P.S. My brother was your weatherman that just left the station up there, Bill Kelly

These have to ship here via cargo ships in not so perfect "containers" and cargo isn't exactly handled gently in loading/unloading. Even if there isn't direct water contact, there is plenty of moist air and the real killer...salt from the ocean environment. I've seen some pretty nasty rusty playfields. Posts and hardware on the top side of the playfield, and pretty much everything on the underside of the playfield can get nasty corrosion.

Even if they are wrapped and protected for the trip (don't bet on it), customs can pretty much have their way with anything that they feel needs to be "inspected" and would not be bothered to wrap them back up.

You might get lucky and score some sweet machines for decent prices, but there is much better odds of disappointment. Better odds playing in Vegas!

That's a good point. I can imagine few things less suspicious than a container full of pinball machines.

I'm out. This post is not meant to imply this, or any, deal could not work out ok. It is meant to imply that the risk to reward ratio is not acceptable to my wife and I any longer. I did contact my family attorney for advice and basically he said the same thing as my lead off sentence above. It could work but the risk ratio is high. One little thing goes wrong and you are wasting countless hours/days trying to resolve the matter by phone/email/in-person? Should one be lucky they can "High Five" everyone on the deal and post accordingly here at Pinside! Should one be unlucky they can likely count on having very little time to post here since it would be more prudent to channel the time at resolving the investment problem/issue(s) on the pins....lol.

Best wishes to all that pursue this further. The other day I was at Costco, with my wife, we seen a 10x10 canopy. Nice vertical leg and aluminum material frame construction. Heavy duty fabric...yada...yada. Anyway, we looked at eachother and thought the same thing..."If we get home and Google this, we could find it cheaper" Then reality hit and we both said, "Nah...it's just not worth the time and effort. We are here now...touch...feel...sniff..lol. Let's grab it and not worry about that shipping/return poilcy stuff in case something goes wrong".

If something goes wrong on this dal...exactly what is the return policy? Lol...exactly. Thank you very much, please drive through. Move along folks, there is nothing further to see here

The return policy is my cousin Tony goes over there from Sicily and pays the man a little visit....

I would happily be in on any of these at those prices:
bk2k
world cup soccer
addams family
twilight zone
magic castle
whitewater

2000-10000 containers fall off of ships into the ocean each year, usually in storms.

that's it, I'm flying to italy, renting a boat, and sailing it back to america myself

<<<2000-10000 containers fall off of ships into the ocean each year, usually in storms.>>>

You reminded me of a story I read about a few years back. Lol..a sea container went overboard and like 30,000 (don't quote me here on exact number) bags of Doritos washed up on the coast of Florida for miles....and miles....and miles...miles of Florida coastline...lol.

Hope that does happen again...especially with pins!!! If it has to happen, please let it be Mayonnaise or Michelob Ultra in large quantities I will not miss either of those two

Sounds better than the Taco Bell Doritos Los Tacos.

You won't save much over Costco prices.

What if you all ready own some containers?

I think I would be happier putting 8k to 10k into pins off of here, Craigslist, the Bash, RGP and Mr Pinball. It would probably be less work and stress too.

Keep the boat clear of the pirates of Somolia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy_in_Somalia
Actually, Italy is north of Somolia, and boat wouldn't go there. I just had to throw the pirates out there

Did I misread this or are you saying you dislike Locos Tacos? What's not to like about orange stained fingers and teeth?

Are they already in Italy? Could save a couple hundred bucks I would imagine.

That's definitely part one. It's interesting to see how many people have never heard of this, as this was done all of the time back maybe even 10 years ago. Back then, Europe couldn't get anything for them so they would send them over here at bargain basement prices -- you could generally buy a container full of pins for about 75% of their retail price with everything factored in.

It was always a crapshoot though, and it became more and more of one every container that arrived -- at the beginning, the sellers were being selective and picking the best machines because they wanted their buyers to buy more. And it worked -- more people bought, and the quality of the machines degraded pretty rapidly to pretty darn blown out examples. At the same time, shipping prices went on the rise, and your savings evaporated quickly.

From the pictures, these seem to be a little better than what was coming off containers a few years ago when everyone basically stopped getting them (makes sense -- with less selling, the 'better machine' inventory had to go up some), but still not great.

Yup. This is delivery of essentially just the back container of a truck. You have to get that off a boat and somehow to travel to you somewhere or another, as well as the whole customs thing.

My guess is that if you did this deal, you're probably saving around maybe 10% of retail prices today, but you're getting a real crapshoot of quality. I wouldn't consider this unless you have a lot of extra money and a lot of time to spend trying to fix stuff up.

way too risky

This is nothing more than a pipesdream. Do the math, consider the risk and read the add very carefully. No way in Hell would I touch this deal. IMHO

That sounds about right on shipping to the coast. It will cost more inland. I shipped a 40' conex from England to Cissna Park, IL in 2004. It cost $3800 total door to door.

Very easy to do.

How would you change the voltage?

I will split this with a few people. Lets grab it.

About 10 years ago a friend and I imported a Container from the far East. Alot of the games were as described above (light corrosion under the playfields, swollen wood on the back of the head, lots of cigarrette smell and some ash in the games). We ended up each making about $1000 and a free pin out of the deal but it was alot of work. We decided not to do it again.

However...if anyone ends up doing this I am on the east coast in a port city (Jacksonville, FL) and could help facilitate transportation from the port to inland areas. I have access to a warehouse where the games could be temporarily stored that has a loading dock where 18 wheelers can load. I have also palletized and shipped dozens of games over the years.

I am not willing to put any money into a deal but am willing to put in time and elbow grease in exchange for one game.

It seems we need some sort of teleportation device to alleviate this issue. Where are we on inventing one?