It looked for all the world as though the Lincolnshire Echo had found a new way to supplement reporters’ wages.

Send them out to an antiques fair armed with £50 each to see how much they could make by spotting that all-elusive bargain and selling it again for a profit.

And with the help of a couple of antiques experts they did just that – doubling their money on one item and making £35 on the sale of another.

But true to form and despite the reporters’ diligence, their extra money went, as tradition dictates, to charity.

Reporters Wendy Inkster and Sarah Miller were dispatched to the Newark International Antiques Fair, Notts, which as well as attracting dealers and buyers from far and wide, also clogs up the road system through sheer weight of numbers.

The golden rule, they were told, was to choose items that appealled to them personally.

Wendy told her readers: “We would never have guessed that the chosen items would be a damaged hall stand built more than a century ago and a telephone with a peculiar ring that was made in Switzerland.

“We walked around for hours and looked at thousands of items and to top it off we were browsing along with thousands of others who were all after the same thing – a bargain.

“But the excitement and anticipation of finding a real gem kept us going.”

They both haggled their dealers down from £95 to £50 to meet their limit.

The oak hall stand, for boots, umbrellas and so on, went at auction for a pleasing £120, while the clock went on display at an antiques shop and sold for £85, spelling success for the Echo’s bargain-hunters.

Their story was reported in the paper’s Home and Garden supplement, published on a Thursday and packed with advice and information to help make readers’ homes a better place to live.

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