Year of weird and wonderful online auctions
A retro Mcdonald’s playground is bringing nostalgic joy to many in Twizel.
Campground manager Tony Ritchie bought a 1990s Mcdonald’s playset via auction website Trade Me earlier this year, to bring fun to holidaymakers.
‘‘I bought it for the cool factor. Kids love it, and heaps of parents play on it. It’s probably the most photographed playground in New Zealand.’’
Ritchie paid a ‘‘ridiculous’’ $11,000 to win the Trade Me auction, snatching the roundabout, the Hamburglar swing and the Chief Big Mac climber from other keen buyers. The auction had more than 115,000 views.
The playset was just one of many items that received attention throughout the year.
Last January, Upper Hutt man Kelvin Acutt auctioned a $6299 engagement ring for a $1 reserve in the hopes of replacing love with a new ute.
The one-carat diamond ring was intended for his girlfriend of two years, who unceremoniously broke up with him two weeks after he had purchased the engagement ring at ‘‘a price that was steeper than the side of a chicken’s face’’.
The 22-year-old posted on Trade Me that having ‘‘a ring without a pretty finger to put it on’’ meant it was time to sell and he was hoping someone would purchase the brand new white gold ring for a pretty penny. It sold for $2820.
A spaceship even popped up on Trade Me in May. The spaceship, which measures 16 metres in diameter, was previously erected at Skyline Luge in Rotorua and sold for $22,360.
In April, an enormous portrait of Helen Clark wound up on Trade Me after it appeared at a Wellington tip.
Wellington City Council spokeswoman Victoria Barton-chapple said: ‘‘It was dropped off where people dump their rubbish. One of the chaps up there noticed it and said it deserves a better resting place, so they cleaned it up and put it on Trade Me.’’
The auction went for $1840 and all funds went to Women’s Refuge.
British pop star Ed Sheeran’s doodle titled Super Ginge raised $10,000 for the Child Cancer Foundation in May.
Sheeran said he thought it was worthwhile donating to the charity because of his experiences visiting children with cancer in hospitals.
‘‘Every time I have visited children with cancer in hospitals, it has always struck me how brave the people that look after them are, as well as the actual kids,’’ he said in a video of him drawing ‘‘Super Ginge #Breakingstereotypes’’.