June 2026 News

With the war in the Ukraine still affecting the excellent Retro products made in Russia by some of our fellow enthusiasts, and now the war in Iran causing other problems globally, it is worth taking a view of the Retro computer market overall.

SelllMyRetro has been impacted by the IOSS VAT rules, and the General Safety Product Regulations for sales into the EU - even though many items were first manufactured and sold into the EU many years ago.  Thankfully, the likelihood of injury from a computer cassette tape, or replacing a rubber drive belt or even a membrane is quite small.

We have worked hard over the years to implement coding to address these issues - although with only a very small team, it is becoming harder every year to keep on top of things and adapt the site.  The next step will be the removal of all small value exemptions on cross-border sales, meaning that (as with the US), every sale into the EU (and then the UK) will be subject to customs duties, which might be a flat fee, or might vary dependent on the country itself (so much for EU unity).

Thankfully, for sellers in the UK, the Royal Mail will calculate and add on customs duties to the postage where relevent for a reasonable fee (50p at the time of writing), so sellers can just adjust your postage rates accordingly to include this.

One thing which has affected us badly has been the impact of the war on raw materials - the price of conductive ink used on keyboard membranes, for example, has gone through the roof, meaning that some membranes may be too expensive to produce in the near term.  As always, compare offers from different sellers to get the best deal.

Vintage Computer Festival 2026

The Vintage Computer Festival 2026 is heading your way - this is being held at the world famous Aintree racecourse just outside Liverpool on 11th - 13th September 2026.

We shall be in attendance with a range of stock from RWAP Software and a few others.

Tickets for the event are now available from here

We hope to see you there

Last updated on : 09/06/2026