His/her reply to me was far less explanatory and very brief: "Sorry for your concern..."

I did a little digging to find out who these terrible people are, and I can only hope that potential customers of theirs read this and take their business elsewhere:

Store name - Candle Company Antiques & Gifts
Location -  3796 Main St., West St. Paul, Manitoba, Canada
Owner(s) - Glenn and Alanna Rossong
Occupation(s) - Keychoppers; destroyers of antique typewriters

It's especially galling that this is being done out of a so-called antique shop. You would think that if anyone would have an appreciation for vintage items it would be the owners of an antique store, but that clearly isn't the case. It's difficult to comprehend that a fine precision instrument such as this Remington could have survived for close to a century - a machine that still has a practical use - only to meet its end at the hands of an antique dealer. I wonder what else they are destroying to make an easier, quicker buck. It's a frustrating situation to say the least, and I have no respect for people who should know and do better.



 

beak wrote:

Had a reply from this herbert saying that he sells over 50 of these sets of keys every year at 50 USD each.  Anyone believe that?

Yes, I believe that. There is a guy in my neighborhood who often gets to yard sales before I do, takes every typewriter he can find, tells sellers it's for the keys, and sells all over the country. I don't know what price he sells keys for nor whether he sells onsey-twosies or complete sets, probably both ways, but he pays more than I can for the typewriters.

Yes,, it's big bucks and moderately high volume. I can't wait for the market to be flooded with good-looking repros from, say, China.

What I received was that shipping costs were too high anyway. Translation: I didn´t listen and I don´t want to consider the ebay international shipping program which effectively halves international shipping costs.

In these cases I like to swear and curse a lot.

Here's yet another one. The auction description even boasts "some rare keys too!" I've sent another one of my messages to the bozo; it might be naive of me to think that even one keychopper can be stopped by making them aware that what they're doing is despicable, but I'm going to keep trying.



Here are the seller's details that we can add to the boycott list.
Store Name: Gwen Delicious Jewelry
Location: Box 193, Saanichlon, British Columbia, V8M 2C3
Owner: Bonnie A. Doyle
Occupation: Keychoppers; destroyer of antique typewriters

 

Okay, that's a weird one.

They're selling a key-less Underwood for $50 and claiming that replacement keys can be bought on eBay for $20. Madness. Clearly the seller has no idea what would be involved in repairing that machine with a random set of keys found on eBay. That has to be one of the strangest keychopper-related ads I've ever seen and it begs the question: who chopped the keys from that Underwood if not the person currently selling the typewriter?