Lincolnshire’s Andrew Rae has an amazing cash register collection, with an item featuring on Marvel’s Loki
A transport boss has spent 40 years and thousands of pounds amassing the UK's biggest collection of cash registers.
Lincolnshire’s Andrew Rae, 57, now has 186 vintage and electronic tills spread around his home after starting his unusual hobby aged 14.
They range from old brass cash registers dating back to 1910 as well as more modern electronic machines.
His tills have even appeared on the big screen and TV, including Marvel Studios' hit TV series Loki.
And Andrew reckons he'd be coining it in if he were to ever sell the collection, which he believes is worth around £50,000.
His home in Spilsby has become a shrine to the machines which are spread throughout almost every single room.
Andrew's obsession started when he first wrote to the director of Notts & Derby Cash Registers as a boy and asked for one of their devices.
Since then, he estimates he has spent between £10,000-£15,000 amassing a unrivalled collection, which is the largest in the country.
He said: “I remember coming out of school one day and a supermarket near school had closed down.
"As I was looking through the windows there was one solitary cash register that had been left behind.
“Eventually I wrote to the director of Notts & Derby Cash Registers and very cheekily said if I could have one.
“Then the pub that I got a part time job at were throwing away a cash register, and I said 'can I have it?' and they agreed.
"And it just grew from there. All of a sudden it just exploded, I started collecting when any opportunity came along.
"We think from the information we can find it’s the largest private collection in the UK, there’s no museum with a collection as big."
Andrew says although his hobby was unconventional it was a "really important part of social history".
His oldest till dates back to 1910 while his newest addition is from 2020, with most being worth around £1,000 each.
Marvel Studios even asked to use them in their latest season of Loki, with one of his tills being used in a scene set in a 1980s McDonalds.
His most valuable is a National Class 500 which he is restoring, which he says would fetch well over £2,000 by itself.
Andrew, who lives with his partner Martin, 53, added: "I think it’s all the intricacies inside of them that fascinates me.
"As a lot of them are mechanical or electromechanical, it’s just something I've always liked.
“I’ve always had this love of cash registers. If we go away on holiday we go away and look at industrial estates or take a walk on a nuclear power station.
"We like anything odd.”
Andrew’s collection started attracting the attention of production companies, who have used his tills for both the small and large screen.
He says he has been involved in several Marvel projects, including Loki.
One of them featured in the stage production of Open All Hours, after he emailed the company stating that he had one of Arkwright’s famously lethal tills.
Andrew added: "What we discovered is that these cash registers are disappearing.
“Your normal humble cash register like Arkwrights till in Open All Hours are rarely found anywhere now.
"I’ve got a Tec that was one of the first electronic cash registers that were fast produced. To be able to use the till was like a dream come true.
“You will really struggle to find a Sharp or Tec cash register from the early 1980s now - mainly because we’ve got them.
“Some of the production companies have discovered we have this collection and we have been loaning them out. We’ve had trips down to Pinewood Studios.
"They’ve been in Loki season 2, we’ve been in another feature film but I can’t mention it because of an NDA.
“We even lent a cash register to a local theatre group, they were the very first people to produce Open All Hours as a play.”
Andrew has covered his home with the retro devices, lining shelves, the living room, the spare room and even converting their garage.
He added: "“They’re all throughout the house, so when people come over they’re shocked. The people at work think I’m mad.
"Even our spare bedroom has cash registers all over it.
“They’re in the conservatory, the lounge, we’ve converted our garage into a storage room. The shed at the bottom is like a workshop, there’s loads.
"We’ve got tills from manufactures that have closed down. We’ve got names who disappeared pretty early on.
“When you open a till, you find things left inside it from the shops, little notes from customers.
"We have one from a chemist shop, inside we found old labels they would give customers.
"So there's lots of history behind every single one and sometimes the things you find inside the tills are just as exciting as the tills themselves.
“We look on Facebook, eBay, anywhere. If we go to a new town, we look around the shops, not for things to buy but for an old shop to see if there’s a till that we could buy.
"I’m not looking at the stock they’re selling, but their cash register."
Andrew hopes a museum will eventually take on his enormous haul of vintage tills.
He added: “I'd love a museum who will look after it and appreciate them, that’s the ideal.
"It’s harder to get a cash register from the 1980s than it is an old ornate one now.
“People might think its a strange thing to collect but they’re disappearing and should be saved."