Who's the Best Comic Art Auction House?

[Murray Clack]

I've seen threads regarding who the best original art seller is, but has anyone asked who is the best original art auction house?

 

Of course, I would think it would be safe to say one of the top criteria would be who has the better "premium fees" and shipping costs, etc.

 

 

[chromium]

As a buyer I'm extremely happy with Heritage. Clink is catching up, but I still feel HA have the best and largest selection on offer with their auctions.

 

Customer service is great and I've never had to wait longer than a day to get a reply to any questions I had. Everything I buy is shipped out promptly, sometimes even before I've paid it

 

Another thing I like is the catalog, sure the internet is king, but it's a lot of fun to browse through it a few days before the auction starts in a comfy chair. Sending it out to me must cost them a fortune (they overnight it) but I've been getting them like clockwork for almost 10 years, even during the 2 year period where I didn't buy any art at all they kept sending it to me.

 

[Pete Marino]

There was a thread about this a few months back.

 

I believe the consensus was this:

 

Ebay for <2k art

2k > 10-15k (ish) Clink

10k+ HA

[jbud73]

I think the term Best is a bit difficult. Best for Buying, Selling, Customer (both buyer and seller) service. Cost vs. the aforementioned factors - I have never been tot he Heritage office in Beverly Hills but I hate it because I have to pay taxes due to its existence.

 

I will say one thing though. Heritage is the only actual Auction Style house in existence. Basically they are the only ones that run a Real "Live Auctions" - Clink, Comic Connect (though they have that bidding reset function that allows time to be extended if there is a late bid) are more like EBAY in that they are time based auctions with a finite time limit to their Auctions.

 

I've bought items from all 4 sources (Heritage, Comiclink, Comic Connect, EBAY). As a buyer I guess it depends on where the items you are most interested end up, that is going to be the BEST Auction site.

[Ironmandrd]

I'm sure there will be a variety of different views on this. Presumably you are asking about which one is the best for you as a seller (ie, to maximize your sales prices). Looking at your question slightly differently:

 

As a starting point, you may want to consider first determining exactly what art you wish to sell piece by piece (since factors such artist, character, interior panel vs splash vs cover, time period, etc. of course play a large role) and also how much you are willing to sell in a given auction or consignment in the aggregate (usually consigning significantly more in the same consignment (for the same or successive auctions) can allow you to negotiate off their standard fees.)

 

You'll also need to do a fair amount of research on each venue, including terms of consignment (it's a contract so you should actually read it and understand the fees very well but also beyond just the fees--for example, what about reserves and if a piece doesn't meet a reserve? or what happens if a buyer fails to pay -- is it offered to the underbidder or automatically listed in the next auction?) and also to see how pieces like yours have sold in the past (to the extent you can)--you may want to pay on CAF to get access to the Market Data Sales History (under Resources).

 

What works better for one person may not work as well for another. All of the 4 main auction-style venues, Heritage, ComicLink, Comic Connect and Ebay, are good in their own ways (and there are other options like Hake's or consigning to a recognized dealer). The trick is not seeing which one is the "best" but finding out which works better for you and the exact pieces you want to sell.

[kav]

I've had great luck with SplashPage Art and Romitaman.

[Mmehdy]

HA.Com by far in my book

[Kevin.J]

1.Heritage

2.ComicLink

3.Comic Connect

4.Ebay

 

Funnily enough in the last 2 years I have spent more money with these in exactly reverse order to my list.

Like Chromium said, never bought anything from Heritage in the last year, still get the catalog

[suspense39]

All star has really high quality stuff, and the auctions are small

[AKA Rick]

Heritage is good, but you need to know how to approach bidding with logic and sanity.

 

Just calculate your "All In" best offer price based off of anticipated buyer premiums, shipping and sales tax (if in CA and TX I think).

 

They're organized and bring to market key pieces, and let the laws of supply and demand dictate the pricing.

 

That's from a "buyer's" perspective

 

As for selling if you're a seller, I'm not sure which brings the best participating audience and final prices, I'd venture to speculate:

 

Under $1,000 - sell it on eBay, you pay about 15% commission after Pay Pal and eBay fees roughly. I'd say $2k is the ceiling to what I'd offer on eBay probably.

 

$1,000-5,000 - sell it on ComicLink, I'm not sure what they take from the seller, since I think they don't take anything from the buyer. They're also good for over $5k, so it's debatable if they can garner high prices comparable to HA, but if an elite "grail" (please don't overuse that term) piece you're best off with Heritage in my opinion. Compare the catalogs and websites.

 

$5,000 or more - sell it on Heritage (and that's where you can see bidding wars and frenzied buyers vying for your high end pieces), so believe the incremental interest they garner through their marketing machine (nice catalogs!) will offset the fees if you were to go to another auction house/site.

 

Forget about the other sites, if a tree falls in the woods yet nobody is there to hear it, does it truly fall? You don't want your pieces selling on dormant sites with low profile little traffic. Remember when Yahoo tried to run auctions? Same with Comic Art Fans? Even with the lure of low fees / no fees, you're better off paying something to get better results.

[Ironmandrd]

Yes, you might have good luck with higher quality pieces with a recognized dealer or a smaller auction venue (like All Star) or an online gallery (like Graphic Collectibles for, for example, a movie poster painting). If you go to CAF and look at all the banners, you'll see a very good representative group of dealers/sites/auction houses. It requires a fair amount of effort and discussions with these venues (and some trial and error) to see what works well for you.

[disruptive_one]

I think Comiclink is gaining. Really been impressed with their lots recently.

[Ironmandrd]

I think Comiclink is gaining. Really been impressed with their lots recently.

 

Yes, for example, the owner of Avengers #144 did well through CLink. HA and CLink have both had a lot of great pieces in the last year.

[Sharkey]

Here's a link to one of the more recent versions of this oft-repeated discussion.

 

Which Auction House Is Better…. Again.

 

 

I've seen threads regarding who the best original art seller is, but has anyone asked who is the best original art auction house?

 

Of course, I would think it would be safe to say one of the top criteria would be who has the better "premium fees" and shipping costs, etc.