Consigning machinery without announcing it

Plenty of good machines never move because somebody is afraid the market will read the listing and draw a conclusion: that a plant is closing, that a customer contract was lost, that a line is being shut. It is a reasonable fear and it is usually solvable, because a listing has no need to mention you at all.

What a listing actually contains

A machine listing is a specification and a set of photographs. Make, model, year, serial, capacity, condition, what tooling comes with it, and images that show the machine rather than the room. That is what a buyer reads, and it is all a buyer needs.

What we never publish

• Your company name.
• Your site, your address, or the location of the machine.
• Your equipment list as a list, which is the document that tells a reader what is happening.
• Any price for the machine, anywhere on this site.
• Any country of manufacture, and no claim about where a machine was made.

If confidentiality matters to you, say so in your first email and tell us what may and may not appear. It is easier to build a listing that way from the start than to edit one afterwards.

The details that give a site away

Confidentiality is usually lost by accident, in ways nobody thinks about:

• Photographs taken in position. A bay layout, a floor marking, a wall sign, a livery, a product on the outfeed, a name on a tote. Take in-position photographs for us by all means, they are useful, and tell us they are internal only. The published photographs are the ones we take at our warehouse, where the background is our floor.
• A list circulated as a list. 40 machines from 1 industry in 1 region is a closure announcement even with no name on it. This is the main reason to consign in batches rather than publishing a floor.
• The machines themselves. Some equipment is specific enough that a knowledgeable reader can name the 3 plants that ran it. Where that is true, say so and we will handle it differently.
• Your own people. A closure leaks from inside far more often than from a listing. Route every equipment question through 1 address and 1 person.

Consigning to a warehouse helps by itself

This is the practical advantage of shipping the machine to Roebuck rather than selling it where it stands. There are no buyers walking your floor, no viewings to host, no riggers arriving at your gate, and no calls to your switchboard from people who want to see the machine. Interest arrives at our desk instead, and the machine is inspected on our floor.

That removes the single most visible signal a plant can send, which is strangers with tape measures in the building while people are still working there.

Being straight with your own team

There is a limit to how quiet a machine move can be, and pretending otherwise costs more than it saves. People notice when equipment leaves. Decide early who inside the building needs to know, tell them properly, and give the rest a plain answer to give if they are asked. A team that has been told something true keeps quiet far better than a team that is guessing.

What to send us first

Tell us what you have, where it is, and what may and may not appear in a listing. We will tell you whether we can sell it and how we would market it without naming you. Nothing you send us is published, and nothing is shared.