Auction Articles

Serious collectors put a lot of time, effort and dollars into building a quality specialized collection. It is not uncommon for a collector to invest many years or a lifetime in building, upgrading and culling the collection; elevating it to museum quality. So what becomes of this effort upon the death of the collector?

We have all heard the horror stories regarding “quick” sales to unscrupulous bargain hunters by ill-advised relatives. How were they to know the collection they sold for  $5,000 was worth $50,000?

I believe that the best way to liquidate a great collection is at public auction utilizing the 3 “Ps” of Preparation, Promotion and Presentation.

As an example, we just sold the life-long Gun & Militaria collection from the Estate of George Moyssiadis from Long Island. The family knew it had value. But how much? We competed with several major auction houses in NYC and Mass to obtain the consignment for auction. We were awarded the contract because we were able to demonstrate the value of the 3 “Ps”. We hired an expert to help with the Preparation of evaluating, categorizing and lotting. The collection was then transported to Pleasant Valley where Bruce Smith and the staff prepared the artifacts for auction, i.e., cleaning, tagging, cataloging and displaying. The Promotion plan was designed by Marketing Director Jessica Meyer Booth. She designed brochures, ad copy and website layout. Special mailing lists were acquired.  Ads were designed for specialty publications such as Gun List and the Shotgun News.

Presentation is important in the layout and timing of the offering as well as in the handling of each lot as it crossed the auction block. Merchandise handlers had to make sure that the items were shown under the lights for all to see in the correct catalog order.

I believe the #1 advantage of utilizing our auction service was the fact that we could offer the Militaria Collection in it’s own “Auction Ring” separate from the main Estate Auction of furniture, artwork, carpets and accessories. The specialty sale with it’s serious, educated crowd of knowledgeable bidders zoomed along at 103 lots an hour compared to the Main auction ring of mixed Estate items that sailed at 80 lots an hour. The results were outstanding. Over 100 Specialized bidders from as far away as Georgia enthusiastically competed for over 450 lots of Militaria in one ring, while 250+ bidders competed for the general merchandise in the main auditorium. Neither crowd was interested in what was going on in the other room and both auctions ended at a reasonable hour.

We have been selling in 2 auction rings for over 2 years now. It is working very well. If you have a specialty collection that you are thinking of liquidating, I would be pleased to talk to you about our services and put the 3 “Ps” to work for you.