If you have ever seen the movie "North by Northwest," you probably remember the auction house scene, in which Cary Grant's character causes a disturbance in order to escape capture by the "bad guys" who are pursuing him. In that scene a few bidders are assembled in a well-appointed, quiet room to place bids in a dignified, orderly manner. A few bids come in by phone as well.
Today's auctions are also orderly, well-organized live events that take place in houses like that of Skinner Inc in Boston. But you might be surprised to know how much of Skinner's sales take place over the Internet!
It's been several years since eBay closed its Live Auctions feature, but live auctions online are alive and well and an ever more important part of traditional auction house activities.
I recently had the pleasure of talking to Kerry Shrives, a vice-president at Skinner who has been there since 1989 (you may also recognize her as one of the regular appraisers on the Antiques Roadshow on PBS.
According to Shrives, when Skinner holds an auction at its headquarters in Boston, a flurry of activity takes behind the scenes in order to link potential bidders around the world:
- One clerk handles live bids that come in through Skinner.com's live bidding platform.
- Another clerk handles live bids that come in through Live Auctioneers, a second bidding platform used by the company.
- A crew of five Internet clerks in total will rotate throughout the day as the sale goes on.
- Collectors who find out about the auction on sites that advertise its sale items (Artfact.com, Auctionzip.com, and, in the UK, the-saleroom.com) come to either Live Auctioneers or Skinner's to place bids in advance of the sale or live bids while the sale is going on.
For any given item, live bids on the floor compete with phone, Internet pre-sale bids, and live Internet bids. When I asked how big a part of Skinner's auction business the Internet represents these days, Shrives surprised me by answering: "In a way, all of it. Our content is accessible online, and we know that it is viewed heavily. More people view auction material via the Web than could ever attend a sale "live." We also have bidding from the Web both in absentee bids submitted online and users who bid in real time over the Internet."
To Be Continued...Part 2 of Greg's interview with Kerry Shrives can be found on this page, where she reveals how eBay's closure of its Live Auctions business affected Skinner's Internet bidding and how it adapted to the change.
About the Author
Greg Holden is AuctionBytes Contributing Editor. He is a journalist and the author of many books, including "Starting an Online Business For Dummies," "Go Google: 20 Ways to Reach More Customers and Build Revenue with Google Business Tools," and several books about eBay, including "How to Do Everything with Your eBay Business," second edition, and "Secrets of the eBay Millionaires," both published by Osborne-McGraw Hill. Find out more on Greg's website, which includes his blog, a list of his books, and his fiction and biographical writing.
