Photograph by Robert Scheer
A TV crew films at Sunnyvale's Heritage Antiques for an edition of "Got It! Got It! Need It! Got It!"
By MICHELLE KU
Whether it's dolls, antiques, records, model trains or egg beaters, there's something out there that someone collects.
It's from that premise that Greg Bartschenfeld, a Sunnyvale resident and a film and television student at De Anza College, began his public access cable television show, Got It! Got It! Need It! Got It!
Begun in March, Got It! Got It! Need It! Got It! is a 30-minute program that features expert collectors, their collectibles and their shops (if they have one).
To date, seven shows have been produced and aired as part of the Cupertino-Los Altos Public Access Channel 26 lineup. It can be viewed in Sunnyvale on TCI's channel 30.
Last month, Bartschenfeld and his crew taped their first remote shoot at Heritage Antiques in Sunnyvale Town and Country shopping center. The expert guests for the show were Peter Meissner and Karen Searles, owner and manager, respectively, of Heritage Antiques. The show aired in Sunnyvale on Aug. 27.
"Normally we try to do it in the studio, but because of the size of the things in the store, we decided to bring the studio to the store," Bartschenfeld said. "For him to put furniture in a van would have been kind of awkward."
Bartschenfeld got the idea for Got It! from Personal F/X, a show on the F/X network. Collectors are invited on that show to have their items evaluated by professional appraisers. Then the owners are asked if they want to entertain offers for their items and if they do, viewers can call up and bid on the items.
Got It! differs from Personal F/X in that the items that are shown aren't sold.
"We want information about the item, the history of it. We don't allow the collectors to sell the item on the show," Bartschenfeld said. "We encourage our guests not to mention prices, but sometimes they'll give a ballpark figure on how much it's worth nationally."
The name of the show was inspired from Bartschenfeld's memories of his son as a young child.
"At the very beginning of the show, there are two young boys with the baseball cards. When my son was young, I noticed that was a universal trait with kids and baseball cards," Bartschenfeld said.
"That's kind of why I have the two kids [who are trading business cards during the opening credits] up there to explain the show. I believe that most collectors do that mentally."
To get the show on public access television, Bartschenfeld had to make a proposal and meet the requirement of either working full-time in Cupertino, living in Cupertino or being a De Anza student.
"Part of the requirement in producing a public access show is that it be informative," said Bartschenfeld, the producer and director. "We're an educational show. We try to show people what's valuable."
He also had to sign a contract and gather his own crew.
Bartschenfeld gets the guests for his show by visiting shops, watching television and keeping his eyes open. He got Don Thornton, a Sunnyvale resident who collects egg beaters, to be his guest after Bartschenfeld's wife saw Thornton, his egg beaters and the book that he wrote, on the Today show.
The guests for the next show that will be taped about model trains were contacted through referrals that Bartschenfeld got from hobby shops. The expert collectors for that show will be members of the Golden Spike Club who meet at The Great Mall where they have a storefront display of trains. The date for the taping has yet to be arranged, but it too will be a remote shoot for Bartschenfeld and his crew.
Got It! Got It! Need It! Got It! can be seen on TCI Cupertino-Los Altos on Channel 26 every Saturday at 7:30 p.m. In Sunnyvale, it can be seen on TCI Sunnyvale on Channel 30 on the second and fourth Tuesdays of the month at 6 p.m.
"I really am proud of the way we put the shows together. I think we're doing a real good job, and each one is a little bit better than the one before," Bartschenfeld said. "None of us are full-time television professionals, but I'm amazed at how professional some of our shows are beginning to look."
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, September 11, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.