Good old-fashioned know-how

The 44-year-old owner of the Massachusetts Antiques Cooperative, the largest and oldest cooperative of its kind in the Boston area, understands the market and people's antique-buying priorities.

Her cooperative is a consortium of about 125 vendors, local and not-so-local, who, for a monthly fee of $3 a square foot, rent from Hartwell's nondescript, beige two-story building on Felton Street. Clients stock their stalls with furniture, jewelry, or memorabilia from decades and even centuries past.

Booths blend from one to another with treasures that range from beaded purses, antique wood and marble-topped furniture, grandfather clocks, century-old jewelry worn by now unknown women, and knickknacks that were loved and cherished during some decorating period past. One piece dates to the 16th century.

As the economy shifts, so does the antique industry, Hartwell said of the objects that adorn every wall, shelf, nook, and space in the building. An aged white wood and stained-glass confectioner's storefront from Belgium takes up most of the ceiling space in the front of the 10,000-square-foot store.

Hartwell and her dealers find that when the economy is down, business increases on the high end and decreases on the low end.

It is also when a moneyed collector will buy a grandfather clock for $1,400 or the marble-topped table for $950, she said.

Those items become more available because a depressed economy or recession is ``when individuals find alternate means of finding income,'' Hartwell said.

``People tend to sell things that aren't as critical to their everyday life,'' she said of what her vendors buy and then resell at her store.

``It is during a recession or tough economy that people will sell off parts of collections,'' she said. ``Museums and organizations do it all the time. That's how we get our merchandise.''

```We really don't need Aunt Esther's antique. Let's sell it,''' Hartwell said of the people who are motivated to sell in a recession.

The dicey economy also has her vendors bringing down prices.

And collectors come out of the woodwork for those good prices - and good pieces.

There is a downside, though, she said. Low-end spending just doesn't exist right now. Buyers, she said, are purchasing only the best, most expensive, items.

Don Steele of Delightful Relics Antiques in Atkinson, N.H., buys from the cooperative and estates and then resells on the Internet.

``I buy when it's available, if I can afford it,'' he said.

Like Hartwell, he has also seen the business shift recently.

``Spur-of-the-moment things, those aren't selling very well,'' Steele said. ``High-end items are selling just as well as ever.''

For example, last week he sold a circa 1770 mahogany desk for $9,000 that he found a few weeks earlier at a Lynn estate sale. Had he waited for an upcoming auction he might have netted a better profit, he said. But he wasn't willing to take the chance.

Nancy Cranker of Applegate Antiques in Norwood, who also has a booth at Hartwell's store, has the same theory.

``My philosophy is I'd rather make a little less profit and reinvest than to hold on for that maximum [price]. I make it more affordable than what they might find on Newbury Street,'' Cranker said. ``It works for me. If I can turn my money over several times in a year versus holding on to something for several months before I sell it once, I feel I make more money in the long run.''

She likes having a booth at the Felton Street site because, she said, Hartwell does well with high-end pieces.

``I put a variety of items there, but I have an easier time selling those pieces in Waltham than Norwood,'' she said of the porcelain, artwork, jewelry, and pottery she offers. ``They go more quickly.''

``I'm surviving and I know there are other people who are not,'' Cranker said. ``I'm making a profit - I won't say it's my best year. Last year was better.''

Unlike Cranker and Steele, Lorraine Trethewey of Southborough sells middle-end pieces at Hartwell's store.

``Overall, everyone would agree sales are down,'' she said of her linens, china, and glassware.

There is promise of a silver lining though. Trethewey has noticed increased spending at her booth during the last few weeks and hopes it's a sign of more sales to come - for all the dealers.

Hartwell probably saw that coming, too.