A slice of history - for 70p (From Stroud News and Journal)

A slice of history - for 70p

Will Saunders gets stuck into some high-brow thinking with his 30p copy of Marcus Aurelius' Meditations. He also picked up the Jules Verne classic Around the World in Eighty Days for a mere 70p.

WHETHER you need replacement baby clothes, classic records or new reading material, there is something for everyone in the wonderful world of car boot sales. Reporter Will Saunders went to a sale at Stroud Rugby Club to hunt for bargains.

OH sweet Moses! It's a Noel's House Party boardgame circa 1994. Rarely seen intact, how could they give this away? Breathlessly, I ask if all the bits are in there. "Yes," the chap on the stall replies. "The Grab a Grand booth, the little plastic Gotcha, the lot." This is too good to be true. "And how much?" I casually inquire, while my heart pumps neat adrenaline. "That?", he says, turning it around a bit like a man weighing up a prize haddock, "70p." God in heaven, 70p for a slice of televisual history, 70p to be the envy of my friends. Sheer joy, it seems, is cheap to come by at a car boot sale.

The omens had been good ever since I wandered into Stroud Rugby Club that day. It was a beautiful sunny morning and the first thing I clapped eyes on was a model of the Thunderbirds' neat little pied a terre, Tracy (corr) Island - for a tenner. Things were already looking up. I soon found out that other shoppers were equally enthusiastic. Rachel Laffort, 32, said: "They are such good fun and there are always a lot of bargains. I buy a lot of clothes, toys and books here and I also get little presents for people. "You can get some really nice stuff. I always prefer the genuine people who just come along to sell off their old things to the people who do it as a business."

The stallholders tend to belong to one of two distinct camps. First there are the family clear-outs, where all the tat that's been accumulating in the attic for decades is crammed into the estate car and flogged. One of these occasional entrepreneurs is Nailsworth mum Julie Burrows, 38, who is running her stall while her little son seems to be trying to outdo her with his own little toy-selling enterprise around her feet. "My kids have grown out of a lot of things and there was a lot of stuff in the loft we don't use," she explained. "I'm doing my patio at the moment so any proceeds will go towards that." And how much has she made so far? "About £25," she said. "But as long as I get back my £4 deposit I'll be happy."

The second, and more rare, type of car-booters are the 'professionals', who run stalls every week and obviously take the whole thing a lot more seriously. Second-hand video impresario Stephen Markovic, 45, is one of the latter. But he says he prefers to hunt for treasures while his daughters Rosie, 18, and Sharon, 16, do the work. "We come almost every week," he said. "I am not too keen on selling stuff, the girls can do that. "I prefer to come and look around. "You get a buzz from it. You have always got to look for a bargain because you never know what you might find. You can virtually find whatever you want in a boot sale." Asked for his best ever bargain, he replied: "I remember one woman gave me 250 videos for £20 once because she wanted to go home."