West Sussex Gazette

The phones had been going beserk and then they broke Spencer Swaffer was curiously relieved – a little break from the high pressure, fiercely -  competitive world of decorative antiques.

Spencer, who this year celebrates 25 years in the business in Arundel, admits it’s a tough world in which you have to be determined if you are going to succeed.

 

And succeed he has.

 

In his quarter of a century, he has increased his business to the point where it is virtually unrivalled in the country – a fast turn over affair which operates in a world market.

Once a week Spencer will travel to Paris to pick up antiques to sell; every day his contacts are on the look out for items for him to buy.

All the major country auctions in the UK are covered by a network of paid sourcers who send parcels of photographs of lots to him on a daily basis.

 

Once they are in Arundel, there is no chance that the goods will gather dust. His stock changes so fast that in no two weeks will his Aladdin’s Cave like showrooms look the same. Always the pressure is on hi to stay one stop ahead of his competitors. Spencer can`t afford to relax. If his rivals get to the market in Paris at seven in the morning, Spencer will have been there since three, his instinctive yes as sharp as ever.

 

He is self-taught on the business. `It’s the only way to do it. "The only way to learn is to buy something and listen to why the dealers won’t buy it off you. 

 

The professionals will tell you why they aren’t buying something, but they will never tell you why they are. You have to learn why."

 

It`s an aspect of a worked which is "colossally secretive". No one wants to give anything away."

 

Spencer admits he is not the most popular dealer in the country. Success in the field doesn’t endear you to your contemporaries and he is under no illusions about what they might be saying about him behind his back. 

 

He is perceived as ruthless. He prefers the word determined. It`s a world in which you are frequently let down. Spencer’s proud claim is that he never lets down anyone.

 

He hates the thought of a bill he hasn`t paid. If the newspaper bill turns up at 7am, he’ll have paid it by five past.

 

Driving him is the sheer thrill of being out there buying and an enduring love of the objects he deals in - a love of display which has been with him all his life.

 

"When I was 12 I had a museum in my bedroom. I was always a bit of a loner and I used to spend hours roaming the South Downs picking up shards of Roman pottery and fossils. I then graduated to jumble sales buying funny things in the days when you still could." 

 

Oddly, it was journalism, however, which provided his first career. In the early 70s he worked for the Argus in both Brighton and Chichester. It came to an end when he realised he couldn’t do what his editor was requiring. 

 

An awful tragedy saw two children die on a beach - a story which Spencer followed right through. Then came the day when The Sun scooped on the fact that the bereaved mother was pregnant again. 

 

Spencer was told to interview her - the moment at which he realised that, given the precise circumstances of her children’s deaths, he didn`t have it in him to ask the questions his newspaper would be wanting hi to ask. 

 

He resigned that night, a move he has never regretted. His shop in Arundel had been up and running for a year, and it was clear it was going to be a success. 

 

Spencer had continued to pursue his antiques interest during his newspaper days and was still doing a lot of the country antiques fairs. He was also fast gaining a reputation for his nous. 

 

I used to do one in Steyning on a Saturday morning selling one or two things that I had found during the week. There would always be a queue of London dealers waiting there for me. They knew that I had an eye for it." 

 

A shop became available at the bottom end of Arundel High Street. Spencer took it, and eight years later was able to move to his current premises further up. 

 

His principal business is selling to dealers, probably 70 per cent American, 30 per cent English. On top of this, he has a faithful following of local private people and visitors. 

 

He says he hesitated to sound remotely like Tesco`s but he keeps prices deliberately low because he believes in a fast turn-over. 

 

That`s why the bulk of his business is with the dealers. A private person will come in and look. go home and ponder, come back and think again and then finally return to buy. The chances are that the piece will have been long since sold by them. 

 

The pace is a fast one. Last week, for instance, Spencer went to an antiques fair in LIlle. He left Arundel at one in the morning, was in Lille by six am and was back in Arundel by lunchtime to see a dealer from New York.

 

"Tonight I go to Paris at 8:30. I will be out on the streets at three tomorrow morning for an antiques fair. I will be back in the shop by lunchtime tomorrow. Every single week of my life I go to Paris."

 

The pieces he deals in come under the heading decorative antiques, a category which ranges from quite formal English things from a Westminster town house to funny, idiosyncratic things from a Scottish farmhouse to sunbleached items from Provence.

 

The Americans lap it up for the simple reason that they don`t have the like of it themselves. US clients are quite capable of buying a whole wall of items simply because they like the "look" Spencer will have carefully created.

 

"But it`s quite a challenge to always stay one step ahead of everybody else. Other dealers will be watching out for what I buy and trying to keep up."

 

It`s a faddish business, and fashions change.

 

At the moment there are two distinct fashions - one is for a very clean interior with a touch of something very old and characterful; the other, at the other end of the spectrum, is for a deliberately cluttered look.

 

Spencer`s ability to read the trends has allowed him to make his premises the top provincial shop in the country simply for his range of goods.

 

But success brings its down sides.

 

"Yesterday morning the phone was just going berserk between nine and ten in the morning. We has so may telephone calls coming in. We have had to have three lines, and we had three American companies in at the same time. And then the phones broke... In a way, I didn`t want them repaired."

 

But Spencer`s is not the kind of business from which you can just stop he`s no fan of the internet, but hi`s increasingly forced to recognise them as part of his world.

 

But Spencer`s is not the kind of business from which you can just step off. He resents computerisation and he`s no fan of the internet, but he’s increasingly forced to recognise them as part of his world.

 

And the only way forward is for the business to grow - even though Spencer is less than delighted that antiques have become such a hugely popular thing, with TC programmes on the subject proliferation all the time.

 

But then, as he admits, he remains a loner.

 

He spends his days talking to people to sell to them or talking to them to buy from then. But at heart he’s still the little boy who would roam the Downs alone in his search for Roman pottery ...