The Torch of Vic Deals is Being Passed

Fergus Goodall Smith

Vic Deals, Wellington’s beloved, quirky, and prestigious Facebook community page is up for sale. A new banner now adorns the home page, emblazoned with the words ‘vic deals 4 sale - asking price: $1,000,000,000 one billion dollars’, a reference to Austin Powers supervillain Dr Evil. 

The sale of the community group has made many Wellingtonians come to the realisation that the page could even be sold. Vic Deals is in fact a business that makes profit, describing itself as an ‘online trading forum’. The owners of the group, brothers Charlie and Michael Ward, have operated the page since 2022, and make their money through advertisements, whether it be for a local business or someone trying to sub-let their flat. 

The page originally started in 2012 as a place for students at Victoria University to find flats and flatmates, and occasionally spill some tea, but it’s ballooned out to epic proportions since then. 

Vic Deals currently has a whopping 247,800 members, with around 100 posts a day, making it a hubbub of activity. Vic Deals has a place in many people’s hearts. Time and time again has the page reunited folk with their ID’s following a big night on the rark, or given someone just the right drill piece to finish off their DIY deck. It’s a place of gossip, politics, narking, and trade, and we love it. 

No one actually knows exactly how much the page is selling for, but the current owners told RNZ that the former owner, Grant Burley, purchased the platform for a slab of Tuis and some Homegrown tickets. Sounds about right. 

Charlie Ward, the departing owner, was only 19 when he purchased the page as a way to gain some experience in business and administration. If Charlie did it, so could you (yes you, the reader, buy it!).