I agree that the entire episode was scripted -- they knew too much about Jo Siffert; they were too tight on the price range; the charade about not being to open the case; and the list goes on and on. I am confident that this episode was researched and scripted, long before Randy walked into the shop and met Rick.

I spent a lot of time in pawnshops as a kid, in the late 1960s, as a couple of my friends' fathers owned shops. These were always interesting afternoons, long before we had reality TV. My mind starts to wander, and I imagine the Rolex Daytonas and Submariners that might have been in the vault, not to mention the Carreras and Autavias.

Jeff

++++++++++++++++++++++

: About a year ago the producer of one of the other Reality TV Pawn
: shows (not Pawn Stars) emailed me about procuring a particular
: American railroad pocket watch, an example of which he had seen
: on my website. The watch was a 16 size, 60 hour Bunn Special
: made by the Illinois Watch Company. His email contained his cell
: number so I called him up. He told me that they were going to be
: filming an episode in Chicago and one of the segments was based
: on a true story of buying one of these Bunn Specials. I asked
: him a bunch of questions and the gist of what was going on was
: that his show was a re-enactment of true stories from a real
: pawn shop. The seller/pawner in this case would be an actor and
: the watch would be a prop. BTW, I did not end up letting him use
: one of my watches but referred him to a good friend who actually
: lives in Chicago who lent the show one of his.

: I make no claim to know how Pawn Stars works. My bet is that the
: actual buys you see are re-enacted to some extent, but perhaps
: not to the extent of the show which contacted me.

: The reason I say this is that it has to seem weird to all of us
: Heuer people that Rick would know the value of a scarce Heuer
: version like this seemingly right off the top of his head. I
: live in old jewelry stores and pawnshops all over the country. I
: know pawnshop owners from the big shops and the small shops and
: the multi-generation old shops to the new shops. I don't think I
: know any of them who would know about a watch like this Siffert
: except perhaps peripherally. I can tell you with very little
: doubt that none of the owners I know would have offered close to
: 8 grand for this watch as it came in over their counter. Even if
: they might have looked on eBay and observed actual Siffert sales
: they would never have offered more than half. They just don't
: operate like Rick does. There is too much risk and not enough
: reward in offering that much for a watch you don't know
: everything about. I think we can probably safely assume that
: there was a certain amount of "Setup" involved in this
: segment. It is TV. It has to work. Reality does not usually work
: exactly as encountered. Pawn Stars just isn't how the real world
: works.

: Just sayin'

: JohnCote
: Professional Cynic