It’s Not Easy Creating a 26,510 Lot Auction
The lengths we go
to creating this
auction for You...
Just How is it done?
Andrew giving The Kay Goodman Lecture GBPS Leeds 2015
To Join the GBPS visit the website: http://www.gbps.org.ukIt was hardly a question I was expecting, but I was happy to answer. The occasion:
I was honoured to be invited to give the Kay Goodman Lecture at the Great Britain
Philatelic Society National Philatelic Congress Leeds August 2015 ... but there was just
one small problem – as many of you may know ... I am passionate about our hobby –
but I don’t actually collect stamps – however my company does handle more than most!A
T the tender age of 18 I took the decision to stop collecting
when I entered the trade – reasoning that if I continued
to collect and was fortunate enough to have my own
company ... I might end up with a wonderful collection but
No money to pay the mortgage ... so, never being seduced to
‘carry on collecting’ what was I to talk about at the Congress?
Expecting something of a ‘grilling’ with the subject
‘Philatelic Auctions’ I entered the ‘Lion’s Den’, a good
hundred passionate collectors at the Art Deco Queens Hotel
Leeds. A good hour of non-stop questions later, I’m not sure
why nobody asked me why I’m so passionately against huge
‘Buyer’s Premiums’ but one collector expressing amazement
at the size of our auctions asked how we manage to source
so many stamps?
To be honest sometimes we amaze ourselves – but
ultimately it is all about ‘mind-set’ and belief. You see, unlike
other auctions (and dealers) I take the simple view that if
something is not selling it must be too expensive otherwise
you, the collector, would have bid for it and won it at auction
... Therefore, when we present 20,000+ lots with a value of
£1.8 million ... and 10,000 lots sell to almost 2,000 different
bidders/collectors world-wide ... we have 10,000+/- unsold
lots which must be too expensive – so we reduce them all in
estimate (and reserve) according to how long they’ve been
unsold and (unlike other auctions) in your next auction we
tell you how many times they have been unsold so you can
work out how much these stamps have been reduced, and
just how much of a bargain they have become - this forms the
increasingly tempting nucleus of the next auction.
It follows that whilst one auction progresses towards
closing date we have just 3 months to locate and describeat least another 10,000 more lots. ‘Pouring’ in 10,000 newly
sourced and described new lots is no small task. It takes a
Team of 3 or 4 different describer-valuers/buyers combing
the UK (and abroad) ... then breaking/describing collections
with the help of a further 3 or 4 different describers. Bearing
in mind that none of us is becoming any younger ... you may
imagine that we have describer/valuers situated all over the
United Kingdom including a key full-time experienced team
member located in London participating at all of the major
London Stamp Auctions. In our 60th £2,083,177.00 value
celebratory auction somehow the team has managed to
source and describe more than 13,000 new auction lots. With
Christmas break intervening we’ll be lucky to manage that
feat again in our 61st auction.
So where do all the stamps come from? Offering the
U P A Unique Reducing-Estimate System is not for the faint-
hearted. Over the past 15 years we’ve offered more than
1,000,000 lots with valuable collector-owned items on a
commission basis and sold stamps up to £90,000 each, and
collections up to £600,000 – but to do so with lower priced
material logistically would be a nightmare ... so it’s a unique
combination of valuable material upon a commission basis,
lower priced material which we may have sourced and
owned plus collections purchased at auction far and wide
all appropriately described and lotted to suit collectors
(although dealers worldwide still participate too by winning
lots for their own clients). Ownership of a substantial majority
of auction lots permits us to do things others dare not do
... such as our controversial NO-BUYER’S PREMIUM
policy saving collectors up to 27% ... which in turn permits
us to guarantee every lot ... and to offer the Unique U P A
Reducing-Estimate System etc etcHopefully we now have in excess of 20,000 di erent lots ready to create the next auction
by the time our ‘deadline’ has arrived. Now the ‘Admin/Back O ce’ Team takes over ... 100’s
of carefully organised hours’ work go into creating the complimentary 20,000+ lot free
auction catalogue that I’m hoping you will request ... imagine how much time and e ort go
into creating 62 photo-plates comprising 3,511 di erent stamp images, the ‘data-crunching’
to present you with 370 pages of painstakingly presented descriptions but here’s something
you may have noticed but not actually noted ...Please turn to page 93☛
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