Naw, I don't believe that. You ever see them open a "locked" locker and certain items have black tape over their labels? Somebody has already gone through the locker and prepped it for filming. Plus, I highly doubt those four parties would be the only ones bidding. It's a controlled environment.

Yes, the cast and crew has confirmed that they shoot way more auctions than they show. Even on the show itself there's hints, such as them stating in a recent episode that one storage place had 6 lockers up for auction, but the episode only showed 3-4 of those auctions.

I haven't seen the black tape. However, even when showing the auctions the main cast wins, they're never the only ones bidding. They show other people bidding on them all the time. You know when they show the current bid price and there's not a name next to it? That's some anonymous bidder's bid.


Some things on the show are fake. The talking head segments are clearly scripted, or at least directed. Darrell's spat with his son was clearly choreographed. The recent "I'm going to sneak back and look at the locker I just won," bit isn't real (The producers clearly wanted to have a locker gone through earlier in the episode, but I don't think any are actually gone through until after the auctions). The cast always pick something out of the locker to get appraised, whether or not they actually need that appraisal. The scores at the end of the episode are arbitrary, since they're based on the lockers shown, not on all the lockers the cast won, and I think they walk away without a locker at lot less often than shown on the show.

However, as far as the stuff they find inside, I'm betting that's real.

That Mego haul was ridiculous. 40 year old virgin style. That was the first time I was suspect about the show. As a collector, I just couldn't imagine leaving something like that in a storage unit. A sudden death is the only thing that could explain leaving it there. Even if the person was broke, if they could get enough to close out the storage, they wouldve gotten paid big time.

It's become less real as the show has gone on because they now have resources even if they keep saying they're poor. If they're making 10K an episode, no big worries if they bid up a locker for more than it's worth. I wouldn't be surprised if they're forced into buying lockers they don't really want, just for the sake of the show.

Have you once, in your history of watching the show, ever thought the non english speaking mexican or the sweet little ole grandma who places a bid was ever gonna win an auction on this show.

I doubt they are so stupid. This show won't last forever. That's why Pawn Stars never moved their shop. They knew it would end some day and they didn't go nuts.

Jarrod complained about the price of lockers going up, and one of the staff at his store echoed this. The popularity of the show has caused a bunch more people to show up and bid up otherwise cheap lockers. I even read a story where one idiot outbid either B&J or Darrell in the hopes of getting on TV when the cameras weren't even there. So they have to deal with the unforseen consequences of the show's popularity.

But that's only because they're obviously only showing the auctions that the stars of the show win. There's a bunch that they do lose out to those people, i'm sure.

And what's with the giganto pic?

As fumanstan pointed out, they're only going to show ones the main cast won, or at least mainly only show those. They have had a handful of shows that featured auctions others have won, such as bidders Mark Balelo, Nabila, and Jeff. I never expect to see one go to anyone that doesn't have a name next to the bid. This is just creative editing though, not sign of rigging the auctions or lockers.

Also, if you're going to post giant picture, please spoilerize them for size.

There could be an accounting issue, where they'd want to keep their money earned as performers on the show separate from the money they earn on the auctions for their business.

Possibly but I think that may be giving them too much credit.

Balelo, Nabila, and Jeff I'm sure are paid by A&E so thats not a case of a surprise bidder winning. Same thing with the nameless bidders. Some TV time for those bidders to make it look less staged. So between that, the black tape put over manufacuers labels, the incredibly lucky finds, and the "feuds" between Darrell, Jarrod, and Dave, it's gotta be staged. Entertaining? Yes, but staged nonetheless. The bloom is off the rose.

BTW, sorry about the big pic. Just was trying to show a closer look of the cards Darrell "surprisingly" found in his locker.

I don't think any feud with Dave is staged. That dude is clearly a dick and everyone hates him.

First they fake the moon landing, and now Storage Wars? Fuck!

Nabila is based out of North Hollywood, and these guys are territorial. They know which storage places have what. Don't forget, she scored the Paris Hilton locker in 2007 and sold it for $10 million to that guy who put all its contents online. So when she bares her claws over the show coming to her part of town, she's not kidding.

Those cards just seemed like a random thing to plant. No one but geeks would get a warm fuzzy over those. Why not plant a rookie Jordan or something that would have greater appeal.

Yeah me neither. But my ex-brother-in-law went to work in Iraq for a year in 2004. He boxed up his apartment and put it all in storage. He had set up an automatic bank withdrawal to pay for his units. At some point his bank changed hands and they stopped paying the storage unit because his account number changed. Apparently he didn't get word of this until after his two units had been sold.

The guy had a collection of collectibles in one of these that he'd amassed over the course of 25 years. When he got home I went down to the storage place with him. Even though he knew what had happened, he had to hear it from them. This guy, who had served as a Marine for 10 years and had worked in Iraq as a contractor for another, cried for an hour over his stuff. It was pretty sad.

Oh that's awful... but didn't the storage company try to contact him? When the show first aired, I asked the guys at my location about it. They showed me 3 returned letters from one customer, including certified letters, all unanswered. They have to try pretty hard to reach the owner before putting that stuff up for auction.

Yeah Darrell buying a locker for $7,200 in the last episode was completely out of character for him. More often than not, he's the one to go home without anything because prices got too high. So I'm sure someone leaned on him, ha.

On a separate note, I asked a friend who used to do furniture 'upcycling' that was featured in the last few episodes of SW:Texas what she thought of it. While she hadn't seen the show, she said that anyone would be crazy to pay more than a few dollars for old furniture. Between freecycle, craigslist, yard sales, trash day/town dump, she was able to get whatever she needed at minimal effort and almost no cost.

She also said that it's very time consuming and expensive to make it into 'art'. According to her, even a small piece like an end table might take 10 or 15 hours(and big pieces far more), just to repair, strip, sand and paint(often multiple coats), more if there was a complex design. And materials are expensive as well, she said she used to get nearly free paint from a community building co-op where it was donated, but the city where she was living, decided a few years back that paint was hazardous waste, so now they don't accept it anymore. So again, even on a small piece, she might end up spending $50 or more on materials, big pieces a lot more than that. Also you need a studio or workspace, which also costs something.

It wasn't a big stretch for her because she was already a painter, but she said she never made much money on it, even with getting mostly free furniture and paint. She said the big pieces took months to sell and even with mostly doing small accent pieces and standardizing some designs, she basically calculated she was only making a few dollars an hour at best. Her comment was that if you paid more than a trivial amount for furniture, you'd probably lose money--in her opinion, that's why you don't see many people do it, too much work for not much money. She said that there are plenty of custom furniture makers who do very well, but that's a very different business.

Anyway, not a shocker that yet another aspect of these shows is contrived...

They did, but he was out of the country and wasn't getting his mail regularly for some reason. He found out about it a few days after the storage facility sold his stuff. It was awful.

I had no idea what you guys were talking about until tonight. Yeah, that was staged. Barry just throws out a $5k bet like that? No I don't think so.

Barry's not going broke, he's a retired millionaire. Dave's the one people think is losing his shirt.

Again, I've watched that episode a few times now. Dave looks genuinely exctied waiting to hear how much the couch is worth. He literally can't keep still. Also, would anyone on the staff be clever enough to get two completely different stacks of money together to throw people off the scent? I dunno.

Maybe these guys didn't put their money up for this, but it wouldn't surprise me if they got to keep it.

Anyone think the verbal bitchfight between Dave and Sheets Jr. was staged? I really have a hard time believing Hester could handle himself in a fight but he was sure standing up to Brandon. I guess it's easy to be brave with the camera present, too.

Dave has always had a big mouth and doesn't know when to shut up. I'm sure when the cameras aren't around he gets himself in to trouble with it