Britannia AuctionsPrivate treaty sales in Stoke-on-Trent
The buyer for a tunnel kiln or a roller hearth kiln is rarely down the road. It is more likely a UK building products firm a hundred miles away, or a tableware or tile producer abroad where export interest exists, and a general catalogue is unlikely to reach either. Ceramics plant is specialist and the pool is small. Expect a buyer to want a long look before they commit. That is why it suits a private treaty sale.
A negotiated sale means we inspect the plant, write it up with the technical detail a kiln engineer expects, and go to the buyers directly. Offers come to you in writing with our view on each. The same route suits the plastics and food firms across the six towns, where a large moulding machine or a processing line is often worth more than the rest of the factory combined. Our fee is agreed in writing before marketing starts.
Kilns, presses, dryers and glaze lines
Ceramic plant comes in a few types and each has its own market. Kilns, whether tunnel, shuttle, roller hearth or top hat, suit producers who are replacing or adding capacity, and a handful of dealers who dismantle and rebuild them. Isostatic and hydraulic presses, spray dryers, glazing lines and decorating machines have a wider group of buyers, including tile and sanitaryware firms and some outside ceramics altogether.
For all of these the description carries what a technical buyer needs. Firing temperature and length, fuel, control system, date of last rebuild, and the condition of the refractory. Photographs of the inside as well as the outside. We approach the firms and dealers that use this plant, in the UK and, where there is export interest, abroad, and run sealed bids where more than one is serious.
Plastics and food plant from Fenton, Trentham Lakes, Festival Park and Etruria Valley is handled the same way, with the buyer pool drawn from Crewe, Stafford, Uttoxeter and further afield.
Dismantling a kiln is the buyer's project
A kiln does not go out on a forklift. It is stripped in sections by people who know the refractory, then packed and rebuilt at the other end. That work is a large part of what a buyer can afford to pay, so the practical points are settled before offers are invited: gas and electrical disconnection by qualified people, whether the building must be made good, how long the buyer has on site, and whether the plant can be run for a demonstration firing first.
The roads help. The A500 links the estates to the M6 at junctions 15 and 16, and the A50 runs east to Uttoxeter and Derby. What the site itself allows, from the yard and the turning space to the door dimensions and the ground at the crane position, is checked before the description is written.
Where a factory must be handed back before a buyer is found, smaller plant can be moved to our own premises and sold from there. A kiln cannot, so the marketing needs to start early.
What these sales can include
- CNC machining centres and lathes
- Printing presses
- Injection moulding machines
- Packaging lines
- Large generators and switchgear
- Cranes and heavy lifting equipment
- Specialist process plant
- Laboratory and test equipment
- Complete production cells
- Late model plant and vehicles
- Marine and rail equipment
- High value catering and bakery lines
How we market the asset
We inspect the asset, or have it inspected, and prepare a description with photographs, specification, condition and any service history. We then approach buyers directly: dealers who trade in that type of machine, and end users the asset suits. The asset can be advertised openly or offered only to selected parties. How open we are depends on how much confidentiality you need.
Interested buyers inspect by appointment. We attend or arrange access, answer questions and take offers. You are kept informed at each stage but do not have to deal with the buyers yourself.
There is no fixed end date. A private treaty sale takes as long as it takes to find the right buyer at the right price, which is one of its advantages and one of its costs.
The private treaty sales page covers when private treaty beats auction, how offers are handled, fees and what you receive, what to prepare.
Questions about selling in Stoke-on-Trent
- Can a buyer abroad inspect a kiln before committing?
Yes, and it is worth arranging where the value justifies the journey. A visit can take in a firing, the state of the refractory and the measurements, and we set it around your production. Where a buyer cannot travel, the kiln can be inspected on their behalf and a video of a firing sent to them. Payment comes to us in cleared funds before anything leaves the site, and you receive the agreed price less our fee and any agreed costs once those funds have cleared and the plant has been released.
- Is a mould store or a set of press tooling worth selling with the machine?
Often, yes. A hydraulic press with its dies, or a moulding machine with its mould set, is more use to a buyer making the same products than the machine alone, and tooling on its own rarely draws much interest. We list the tooling in the description as available with the machine and let the offers show whether the buyer wants it. Moulds and dies that belong to your customers are set aside and go back to them.
More questions about private treaty
Related services
Guides
- Auction or private treaty: which route to choose
Auction gives you a fixed date and an open market. Private treaty gives you a negotiated price and privacy. This guide sets out when each route suits, what you give up with each, and why many sales use both.
- What happens to unsold lots
Not every lot sells, but the site still has to be cleared. This guide covers why lots go unsold, private treaty after the sale, lowering or removing the reserve, a later sale, scrap and WEEE recycling, and what disposal costs.