Live internet bidding for heritage signature auction.

[rabidwolf]

Did anyone sign up for this real time bidding. And if so does it look look it will actually work. Im debating whether to sign up for it.

[nik]

Oh it works just fine, but make sure you have DSL, or you dont have a prayer.

[Murph]

It works great, but only if you're willing to pay an enormous 20 percent BP instead of a "modest" 15 percent BP.

 

Brian

[rabidwolf]

"It works great, but only if you're willing to pay an enormous 20 percent BP instead of a "modest" 15 percent BP. "

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Interesting, the 20% BP was discretely left out of their email.

[Silver Surfer]

I think this buyers premium stuff is ridiculous. Why am I paying for someone to sell their books? Would you walk into your LCS if you had to pay a 15% tax before you could leave? It really adds up when you make those big purchases.

[rabidwolf]

This is true. But this is Heritage's sneaky way of "only charging the seller 15%" when it in fact comes out to about 30 since most buyers will factor the the juice in. Although I am willing to buy, keeping the buye's juice in mind, I dont think that I will ever consign to them.

[Murph]

At least Heritage advertises in tons of media, sends a huge catalog, and has a tremendously well run live auction. These other places that charge a BP (vault and all star) are laughable. What exactly do we need to pay them a BP for? Their inconvenience of "having" to have an online auction?

 

Brian

[tth2]

I think this buyers premium stuff is ridiculous. Why am I paying for someone to sell their books? Would you walk into your LCS if you had to pay a 15% tax before you could leave? It really adds up when you make those big purchases.

 

So how exactly would you propose that Heritage make money for providing their services? Have you ever seen what kind of fees the big auction houses like Christie's and Sotheby's charge? This is par for the course (and actually less than what they charge).

 

Anyways, what's the big deal? Just do like many do, factor the 15% premium into your bid by taking the real price that you'd be willing to pay, and then divide by 1.15, which then becomes your actual bidding price. In terms of actual cash outlay, you're now no better or worse off than you'd be without BP. I guarantee you most rational bidders are doing the same thing, and the ones who aren't are the ones whining about paying this 15% "tax".

[Silver Surfer]

I don't really see a need to have to pay for Heritage's advertising costs, not for selling comics? The world of comic collecting is a pretty small one and most of the big channels are readily know and viewed often. Who are they catering to anyways? If they are selling an Action #1 then fine charge the fee otherwise I rather use the services of a non-auction like Comic Link, PGC Mint, etc. Less wait, less hassle and probably a better chance of getting what you want for less than you would pay at Heritage. Most well sought after items usually have high reserves so you almost have to ignore calculating the BP's in and bid higher than you normally would..

 

I would prefer that they set up a tiered, flat fee that is a little less onerous? I guess I'm not a big fan of buying through the whole auction process, having to wait 2+ weeks just to pick up a comic and then have to pay 20% on top of it. Just my preference.

[Murph]

So how exactly would you propose that Heritage make money for providing their services?

 

A consignment fee, perhaps? Do you really mean to tell me that these companies making 20-30 percent on EVERY sale aren't making out like bandits? C'mon..

 

Brian

[FFB]

This is true. But this is Heritage's sneaky way of "only charging the seller 15%" when it in fact comes out to about 30 since most buyers will factor the the juice in. Although I am willing to buy, keeping the buye's juice in mind, I dont think that I will ever consign to them.

 

Believe it or not, the 15% bidder's premium and the 15% seller's commission works out to 26% of the total sales price. It's that "new math."

[Hensley300]

I have an opinion about that new math but to put it in words that can be kept here: sell your own book on ebay unless you cannot market it yourself, the plug it here and sell your own book on ebay. Really though, i wouldnt consign anything to anyone unless I didnt have the knowledge or ability as i mentioned earlier to market it myself. And forget about giving those guys any silver age and up book. They'll just take all your profits for printing that fancy color cataloge that could easily just put online

[tth2]

I don't really see a need to have to pay for Heritage's advertising costs, not for selling comics? The world of comic collecting is a pretty small one and most of the big channels are readily know and viewed often. Who are they catering to anyways? If they are selling an Action #1 then fine charge the fee otherwise I rather use the services of a non-auction like Comic Link, PGC Mint, etc. Less wait, less hassle and probably a better chance of getting what you want for less than you would pay at Heritage. Most well sought after items usually have high reserves so you almost have to ignore calculating the BP's in and bid higher than you normally would..

 

I would prefer that they set up a tiered, flat fee that is a little less onerous? I guess I'm not a big fan of buying through the whole auction process, having to wait 2+ weeks just to pick up a comic and then have to pay 20% on top of it. Just my preference.

 

I don't see a need to have to pay for the advertising costs of [fill in a name here: P&G, McD's, Coke, etc.] either, but guess what, I do it everytime I buy one of their products. Or do you think it really costs Coke $0.75 or whatever price it currently retails for, to produce a soda? This is capitalism, my friends, and businesses are entitled to charge as much as they can legally get away with. Usually competition and demand are the factors that put a cap on prices, and as you indicate, there are plenty of competitors to Heritage (and you didn't even include eBay). All you and other collectors have to do is stop bidding on Heritage auctions, and soon this will cause sellers to leave, and then their business will dry up and they'll have to react by lowering prices or doing something else to attract the business back.

 

Would I like to pay a smaller buyer's premium, and if I were a seller, would I like to pay smaller seller's commission? Of course. But right now, if I were looking to sell GA or SA DCs with a value of more than $500, Heritage is the only place I would consider listing because of the high profile of their auctions and the phenomenal prices they are realizing for these types of books, which more than makes up for the combined impact of the seller commission and buyer's premium. As a result, as a buyer of SA DC and GA Duck books, I am always extremely interested in what Heritage is listing because they are offering books that no one else is.

 

Conversely, if I were looking to sell high grade SA Marvels, Comiclink is probably the first place I'd go because their sell rate is high and they are very high profile amongst SA Marvel collectors. I'd then probably look at several other venues for selling SA Marvels before considering Heritage. I think competition from other SA Marvel sites has definitely had an impact on Heritage, as their selection of Marvels has been pretty mediocre for several auctions now. If this phenomenon extended to other genres, then perhaps there would be sufficient pressure to drive down Heritage's prices. However, I will again say that Heritage hold themselves out as being a traditional auction house, and their prices are not out of line with what other traditional auction houses charge.

[tth2]

So how exactly would you propose that Heritage make money for providing their services?

 

A consignment fee, perhaps? Do you really mean to tell me that these companies making 20-30 percent on EVERY sale aren't making out like bandits? C'mon..

 

Brian

 

Of course they are. That's capitalism... And until competition or something else forces them to make less money, they're entitled to make every dime that they're able to.

[tth2]

This is true. But this is Heritage's sneaky way of "only charging the seller 15%" when it in fact comes out to about 30 since most buyers will factor the the juice in. Although I am willing to buy, keeping the buye's juice in mind, I dont think that I will ever consign to them.

 

Believe it or not, the 15% bidder's premium and the 15% seller's commission works out to 26% of the total sales price. It's that "new math."

 

The funny thing is that people are complaining about the pricing from the buyer's side. As a buyer, you're willing to pay whatever you're willing to pay, and if you get it at that price, then great, and if not, it's because you wouldn't pay enough and someone else would. I don't see any difference between this and not meeting a reserve on eBay or one of the crazy asking prices listed on Comiclink.

 

In my opinion, the people who can most legitimately gripe about Heritage's prices are the sellers, because not only do they have to pay a high commission to Heritage, but Heritage's buyer's premium further restricts the actual amount of cash that will flow through to the seller. Sellers then need to balance the impact of these commissions/premiums on their net proceeds against the benefits of Heritage's high profile/sales and marketing. As I indicated in one of the posts above, if I were selling big ticket GA or SA DC, I would still sell on Heritage because the prices realized outweigh the commissions/premiums, whereas I do not believe the same kinds of prices would be realized for these types of books on Comiclink, eBay, etc.

[FFB]

This is true. But this is Heritage's sneaky way of "only charging the seller 15%" when it in fact comes out to about 30 since most buyers will factor the the juice in. Although I am willing to buy, keeping the buye's juice in mind, I dont think that I will ever consign to them.

 

Believe it or not, the 15% bidder's premium and the 15% seller's commission works out to 26% of the total sales price. It's that "new math."

 

The funny thing is that people are complaining about the pricing from the buyer's side. As a buyer, you're willing to pay whatever you're willing to pay, and if you get it at that price, then great, and if not, it's because you wouldn't pay enough and someone else would. I don't see any difference between this and not meeting a reserve on eBay or one of the crazy asking prices listed on Comiclink.

 

In my opinion, the people who can most legitimately gripe about Heritage's prices are the sellers, because not only do they have to pay a high commission to Heritage, but Heritage's buyer's premium further restricts the actual amount of cash that will flow through to the seller. Sellers then need to balance the impact of these commissions/premiums on their net proceeds against the benefits of Heritage's high profile/sales and marketing. As I indicated in one of the posts above, if I were selling big ticket GA or SA DC, I would still sell on Heritage because the prices realized outweigh the commissions/premiums, whereas I do not believe the same kinds of prices would be realized for these types of books on Comiclink, eBay, etc.

 

Yup. And for the record (though I think you figured this out already), I wasn't complaining. Just correcting a commonly cited math error.

 

I would never sell through Heritage, but I don't begrudge them a single penny they make. And I love their catalogs.

[Murph]

Was just pointing out the inaccuracy of your original post. You asked how are they supposed to make money? I pointed out that they're making more than enough money. A few years back on the boards, I went through one of Heritage's auctions and added up the consignment + BP money.. subtracted all their expenses and still came up with them coming out 600k ahead.. So don't worry about how they're supposed to make money, they're doing just fine. This, however, begs the question how much is too much?? Are you perfectly fine with them charging 20-30 percent BP? What exactly do WE get for these BP? If I'm paying 100..200..1000 dollars in BP, I expect to get SOMETHING worthy of such a price tag and I don't mean just the book.

 

Brian

[rabidwolf]

The main purpose for the buyer's fee is to mask the actual consignment cost to the seller. Sellers would be less inclined to sell if the sellers juice was 30%(or 26% as FFB mentioned... I didnt want to do the math earlier.) While sellers realize this for the most part I think the splitting of the juice plays a psychological role... for example pricing something as 2.99 rather than $3. But as a buyer we in fact will be effected as well because in the heat of bidding we can lose track of the significance of the additional 15% that will be added on.

[delekkerste]

So how exactly would you propose that Heritage make money for providing their services? Have you ever seen what kind of fees the big auction houses like Christie's and Sotheby's charge? This is par for the course (and actually less than what they charge).

 

This is not completely accurate. First, Christie's has a sliding scale for their buyers premium which starts at 19.5% and then slides down to 10-12% depending on where the auction is held (Sotheby's has a similar structure which starts at 20%). Secondly, Christie's has a much more favorable commission structure for sellers, starting at 10% and sliding rapidly down to 2%. Granted, the breakpoints are fairly high for the buyers premium because of the type of merchandise both houses sell. But even for smaller lots, the combined premium is barely higher than what Heritage charges and is less than what Heritage reaps from their online sales with the 20% buyers' premium. Lastly, as good a job as Heritage does with their auctions, I also think that Sotheby's and Christie's provide more and better service to their consignors in terms of marketing, etc.

[lou_fine]

I have an opinion about that new math but to put it in words that can be kept here: sell your own book on ebay unless you cannot market it yourself, the plug it here and sell your own book on ebay. Really though, i wouldnt consign anything to anyone unless I didnt have the knowledge or ability as i mentioned earlier to market it myself. And forget about giving those guys any silver age and up book. They'll just take all your profits for printing that fancy color cataloge that could easily just put online

 

I am in full agreement with what tth2 has has stated in his posts. You have to remember that most of the big money purchasers simply never take the time to go onto eBay themselves. These buyers prefer the fancy catalogue and service which Heritage provides and generally ignore eBay as a flea market with far too garbage to search through.

 

As a result, why limit yourself to eBay and some of the big money buyers when you are trying to sell a expensive book?